AI & Crypto: Robovan Transforms Transport, AI Tongue Takes Over, TikTok Cuts Jobs

Speaker 1 This is Right About Now with Ryan Alford, a Radcast Network Production.

Speaker 1 We are the number one business show on the planet with over 1 million downloads a month,

Speaker 1 taking the BS out of business for over six years in over 400 episodes. You ready to start snapping next and cashing checks? Well, it starts right about now.

Speaker 2 What's up, guys? Welcome to Right About Now. It is October 18th, 2024, our weekly business news of the week, whatever random shit else we get into.
You never know with this crew.

Speaker 2 So that's with Brianna over here to my left. What's up?

Speaker 2 What's up? Chris Hansen and Miami. What's up, Chris?

Speaker 3 What's up?

Speaker 2 Hey, ready to bring the heat. Ready to bring the thunder from down under

Speaker 2 here in South Carolina.

Speaker 2 South Carolina.

Speaker 2 Or I know where Brianna was thinking. She's thinking...
Thunder from Down Under. Oh, she knows what that is.

Speaker 2 I didn't even think of it until I said, I'm like, I think that was like a mail review thing or something, right?

Speaker 4 It's like a magic mic type of thing.

Speaker 2 Oh, okay. Yeah, I don't know if I can pull that off.

Speaker 3 It's also a deserted Outpack Steakhouse, I think.

Speaker 2 Yeah.

Speaker 2 Yes. Thunder from Down Under.

Speaker 2 She gets a show in line. We'll let Chris pull that off.
You know, I'm a happily married man, but Chris has not yet crossed the barrier. This doesn't work out.
Maybe Vegas is Showtime, baby.

Speaker 2 Yes, Vegas. Might be shafts like that.
Maybe he's like, yeah, kind of Vegas. He's South Beach.
It might.

Speaker 2 Yeah.

Speaker 2 Not that I go, but South Beach Thunder.

Speaker 2 Who knows? But look, I will say this. I'm just going to get right into it.
I am wearing a hoodie today. It's a little chilly in South Carolina and not just any hoodie.

Speaker 2 Talking about that Brandon Bills gear. You know what I'm talking about.
This thing is tight. And I don't mean like, you know, medium tight.

Speaker 2 I mean like tight as in comfy and looking good appreciate them for always sending us the best gear got hats hoodies t-shirts you know we're taking the bs out of business and they're taking the bs out of dealing with custom merch because that's what they do they do it for us they do it for you to make your brand stand out and just want to get right to them because i'm feeling hey

Speaker 2 this is south carolina for you though we go from you know sweating like a week ago like 88

Speaker 2 and you know it was like a a balmy 40 this morning, I think. I'm like, okay, I'm going to rock that brandability hoodie.
I've been wanting to.

Speaker 2 This has been staring at me in the closet like a, you know, shooting through me, like, oh, I'm going to wear it. No, it's 87.

Speaker 2 I can't put it on. I'll burn up.

Speaker 4 I noticed there's no transition between when the air conditioner goes off and then the heater turns on.

Speaker 2 That's that is South Carolina. You don't get like, you know, oh, we're going to get some 60s and you know, low of 60, high of 70.
This isn't California.

Speaker 2 You know, no, you go straight from 88 in the day, 40 in the morning, you know? And like next week, we'll have, I looked, it's be like 82 at night or daytime and like 47 at night. 40 degree swings.

Speaker 2 So you always got to run that power.

Speaker 4 Yeah, exactly. No break.

Speaker 2 That's how it is. Hope everyone out there is doing well whenever, wherever you're listening.
Hopefully you're watching. So that, number one, you can see this gear I'm rocking.

Speaker 2 I'm rocking my boy Sean Willen's hat too. Lions, not sheep.

Speaker 2 Hope Sean's doing well. I haven't talked to him in a little while.
Had him on the show a couple years ago, but always following him. Super good motivation guy.
I like Sean.

Speaker 2 But

Speaker 2 I will say, I am,

Speaker 2 you know, watching our numbers on YouTube climb up. And if you're not watching on YouTube or Spotify, you got to watch us.
You know, you got to see just how beautiful Breonna, how pretty Chris is.

Speaker 2 You know, you got to deal with me. And, but you come to look at them.
You come to listen to me. Maybe.
Maybe neither.

Speaker 2 But we would appreciate if you go subscribe on YouTube or just make sure you got us followed on Spotify or Apple. That's how this works, folks.
You get the automatic downloads.

Speaker 2 We need those downloads for these sponsors. Come on.
That's how this works. You get free content and we support our sponsors.
So give them a shout. Chris, how's the week been in old Miami there?

Speaker 3 it's good it's quiet i mean florida last week was crazy with all the hurricane stuff so i think it's settled weather's been fairly fairly nice yeah so we're uh

Speaker 2 we're enjoying a break from the rain yeah exactly hopefully no more hurricanes i don't know

Speaker 2 is it looking clear right now

Speaker 3 I mean, so far, so good. Supposedly, there's a cold front rolling in, but it

Speaker 3 doesn't feel very cool outside.

Speaker 2 Yeah.

Speaker 2 What's the business vibe like in Miami these days? Like, you know, South Beach, that area. I mean, you're hanging out with people.

Speaker 2 I mean, with the election and everything, like, what's sort of the temperament?

Speaker 3 I think South Beach is always popping.

Speaker 3 I mean, at least when I've been out there,

Speaker 3 restaurants are still busy. People are going out, you know.
I mean,

Speaker 3 but again, that's South Beach. That's probably a lot of tourism.

Speaker 3 So it's like Vegas. People always got money to come spend here.

Speaker 3 But the local businesses that I speak with is definitely a little bit of

Speaker 3 a little slow right now. But we're also coming into season with all the snowbirds coming back to.
So you can see that just in the traffic.

Speaker 3 You know, you got way more cars on the road now than you did two months ago.

Speaker 2 Yeah. You got the old slow folks.
Are they slow? Are they aggressive?

Speaker 2 They're slow, bro. They're very slow.

Speaker 2 You're like rocking behind them. Like, okay, we're going 40 and a 60.

Speaker 2 Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 I don't know if you can get up to 60 in Miami. I was driving freaking Chris's Ferrari and it's like, you've got the speed machine.
I couldn't get it past like 45.

Speaker 2 It's like, there's just so much traffic. Yeah.

Speaker 4 The traffic is getting bad in Greenville, too. I'll tell you what.
Wasn't expecting that.

Speaker 2 Yeah. Yeah.
Oh. Yeah.

Speaker 2 G. Vegas traffic, baby.
Surprisingly thick sometimes. Yeah, I tell you what.

Speaker 2 I live 0.8 miles from work and coming through downtown, it's been taking me like 14 to 16 minutes. Like 0.8.

Speaker 2 Yeah,

Speaker 4 not eight miles.

Speaker 2 0.8.

Speaker 2 It's over the river and through the woods to kind of get over here, though, from our house.

Speaker 4 You could throw a rock and probably hit your house from my house.

Speaker 2 You could definitely hit a driver close to it.

Speaker 2 But that's why

Speaker 2 I'm getting me like an e-bike. So I'm going to have Natalie, who's our sponsorship driver.
We're going to find like an electric motorcycle company.

Speaker 2 I got like an e-bike now, but it's not quite

Speaker 2 like motorcyclish enough for me. I need like a little electric motorcycle.

Speaker 4 I did see, in case you're interested, somebody here parks their Razor scooter.

Speaker 2 Could probably get one of those. I'm not going to scoot.

Speaker 2 I'm sorry. Like, I got to draw the line somewhere.
Like, the scooter is just not me. I know adults ride them.
I look at the adult scooters, but I'm too big for that.

Speaker 2 Not only am I an adult, but I'm a big adult. So it's like, these me and me riding down the trail in the scooter? Like, hey, guys, coming through.
Look out. Beep, beep.

Speaker 2 Big guy on a little scooter. I'll go for it.
Yeah. No, I don't think so.
I want like Cafe Racer, you know? Like, well, I've got my eye on a couple. We'll see what we can pull off here.

Speaker 2 It's not a sponsor. I might just have to buy one.

Speaker 4 Yes, you heard it here, folks.

Speaker 2 Sponsor Ryan, who needs a motorcycle scooter. Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 4 Speaking of money, if you're interested, I have an article here from CNBC.

Speaker 4 It does look like things in the business news world are picking up this week. Last week was a little bit quiet.

Speaker 4 This week we have GM investing $625 million in a joint venture to mine EV battery lithium in the U.S.

Speaker 4 So GM is establishing a joint venture with Lithium Americas Corp. that includes the automaker supplying $625 million in cash and credit to the company.

Speaker 4 So it looks like this, sourcing these EV materials, is coming out of Nevada.

Speaker 2 Brianna's a little bit of a conspiracy theorist. So I'm just going to let our audience know this.
You're going to learn this about her.

Speaker 2 I think this is a setup for us to somehow talk about the North Carolina.

Speaker 2 If you're following on Facebook, all the conspiracy theories about the land in North Carolina, is this a setup to actually get to that?

Speaker 4 It's not.

Speaker 2 It's truly, truly not.

Speaker 2 I thought that was a setup, too.

Speaker 2 Oh, yeah.

Speaker 3 I was was like, Don't tell me they're about to start mining in North Carolina, though.

Speaker 2 Yeah,

Speaker 2 but somewhere else. So you're just, you're just singing.
This is signaling, virtue signaling that

Speaker 2 this is a thing, this lithium mining. And it might take places some places, not in North Carolina or South Carolina.

Speaker 4 This is in Nevada, but if we could do a spin-off show that's just Chris and I and our conspiracy theory.

Speaker 2 Yes, the right about now conspiracy theory assist

Speaker 2 series. Here we go.

Speaker 4 There you go.

Speaker 4 No, I actually just pulled this article because I thought it was really good. I liked to see money being spent,

Speaker 4 you know, pulling resources from America for American companies. So, you know, obviously we get a lot of our resources from overseas.

Speaker 4 I think it's good that we invest in pulling our own resources here.

Speaker 2 I mean, one way or another, the battery thing is not going back in the bottle. That genie is not going back in the bottle.

Speaker 2 You know, I think we've realized that not every car is going to be electric by 2030,

Speaker 2 but the battery thing is moving forward at a high pace.

Speaker 2 And so if we can make the materials, mine the materials here, keep as much of that happening here, like you said, driving jobs, driving opportunities, and then obviously our own resources, that's extremely important and newsworthy.

Speaker 2 Because I do think You know, you were talking about the electric motorcycle thing. The battery technology has come a long way.

Speaker 2 The things things that can be, I mean, think about all the yard tools, all the stuff, like the stuff that just had, had to be gas 15, 20 years ago.

Speaker 2 Now, I mean, there's, I don't know, South Carolina, we don't need it, but snowblowers, like electric snow, like chainsaws, which is kind of scary.

Speaker 3 My dad's noise in an electric chainsaw cutting up trees from after the hurricane.

Speaker 2 That scares me a little bit because I feel like you need that noise feedback because it's a chainsaw. I think you almost need that

Speaker 2 just to remind you how dangerous it is. It's just be like, oh, you quietly cut your arm off.
Oh, yeah.

Speaker 2 Like,

Speaker 2 well, that's not good. But blowers, I got a blower that practically like moves my house off the foundation.
It's like, is it electric? It's electric and it's strong.

Speaker 4 We still have a gas or we have like the, I don't know, 600 gas power backpack leaf blower from when we lived on a farm and we're in like our little subdivision house with it.

Speaker 2 Yeah. But the battery technology has come a long way.
A lot lot of things are using it so if we can mine it here i do think more and more vehicles

Speaker 2 you know i i can get behind the motorcycles and scooters and all that stuff i don't know how many

Speaker 2 you know if you got to take cross country these batteries have to come a long way before you have to be charging every i don't know how far that's that's kind of been my i like the rivians they're stylish It's probably like the coolest styling that I like, but I'm just been on the fence because I don't, and I don't even drive that far.

Speaker 2 But if I want to hop in the car and go to Nashville or something, I ain't making it in one of those things.

Speaker 2 Not on one charge.

Speaker 4 Because you can go an estimated 420 miles on one charge in the Rivian.

Speaker 2 Yeah, that's the only thing that's getting to Nashville. Nashville is about 600 miles, 550 maybe or close.

Speaker 2 And so, but, and that's then, I don't think of that as that far. It's like five or six hours.
And

Speaker 4 I don't know. I think it only works if you find a charging station that's like conveniently located.
So you're going to stop and have lunch. So you plug in, go into the restaurant, have lunch.

Speaker 4 And then when you get back out.

Speaker 2 I'm Clark Roswell, baby. This is how long can we tolerate in the car to get there?

Speaker 2 Oh, I'm not.

Speaker 4 Oh, I'm like, oh, I'm going on a road trip. I'm going to get my snacks.

Speaker 2 I'm going to get some more. Oh, yeah.
You stop once in the beginning and you load up. You know, and this is like Dumb Moderma, too.
We get the glass bottles. You got to go here.
Hank the bottle.

Speaker 2 Oh, my gosh.

Speaker 4 Well, speaking of electric vehicles, I don't know if you guys saw this, but Elon Musk unveiled the Robovan. It's a Robovan, but we're calling it Robovin.

Speaker 4 It is a robot taxi. It looks like this.

Speaker 2 Yeah, it's pretty spiffy.

Speaker 4 So Tesla had a pretty big week this week. I did not include it in our news articles, but I don't know if you guys saw he launched a spaceship.
I don't know if that's the right term.

Speaker 4 And then it came back and he caught it in like a little thing and caught, it caught it. It was really cool.

Speaker 2 I saw the video. The RoboVan thing,

Speaker 2 I didn't see it live.

Speaker 2 I haven't checked all every single article. I thought it was getting like panned for some reason as not being that great.
I don't know if, but I don't know if that's just

Speaker 2 the mainstream news now hating on everything Elon does because you know, he's pro-Trump.

Speaker 2 But, or if it really was lackluster. I don't know.
Chris, did you see any of that?

Speaker 3 Yeah, I saw more people talking about the actual robots that they revealed.

Speaker 4 Yes, Optimus.

Speaker 2 Optimus Prime.

Speaker 3 I also read that they were not autonomous, that they were still humans controlling them remotely behind. So you had like a robot bartender that was communicating.

Speaker 3 Well, you still had a human somewhere in a control center controlling this.

Speaker 2 So

Speaker 3 they were kind of building up to like a Steve Jobs type of thing. It's like you have this big hype release, but like the technology is still not like there.
It's not that great.

Speaker 3 So

Speaker 3 that's what I took from it.

Speaker 2 I don't know.

Speaker 3 I don't know how I feel about all the robot stuff.

Speaker 4 It freaks me out, but it's definitely interesting. I just dropped a link with a video to the van if you guys want to check it out.

Speaker 4 And yeah, I heard the same thing that you heard, Chris, that the humanoid Optimus was like, there was somebody speaking through it. So they were like serving drinks at the event that Elon had.

Speaker 4 But yeah, it still was like human-controlled robot, which I kind of like the idea of a human-controlled robot. I don't need a robot taking over my house.

Speaker 2 I've seen a lot of movies. Yeah, the movies remotely

Speaker 3 remote robot operators

Speaker 2 sitting at home like with their robot body.

Speaker 2 Makes sense.

Speaker 4 Yeah, it'll be like the robots doing the job the human used to do, like checking out at the grocery store, store, but the human sitting at home on a computer controlling the robot. It's wild.

Speaker 2 The robo-taxi thing makes sense to me, you know, like

Speaker 2 gets, but it's, yeah, I still,

Speaker 2 I don't know where the conversion of, you know, humans on the road versus robots on the road, like

Speaker 2 how you cross those paths of the reality of them having an accident versus the human, even if it's the human, then

Speaker 2 it just seems like that's an all-or-that's past my pay grade, but like it feels like an all-or-nothing proposition. Like if you moved into a new, like if we build a new city

Speaker 2 and

Speaker 2 day one,

Speaker 2 every vehicle was a

Speaker 2 robo-taxi, you know, so that it's all powered that way versus the intermix of old tech, new tech, robots, non-then that seems feasible. Yeah.

Speaker 2 I don't know how we're going to interject these two worlds together in a safe

Speaker 2 and legally

Speaker 2 enforceable way.

Speaker 4 I think I'm more comfortable driving on the roads with robots than I am driving on the roads with Joe Schmo, who may or may not be a licensed person.

Speaker 2 Everybody's on their phone anyway. And so it's like, all right, we can acknowledge that or not and like get some robo vans going.
And I'd be fine taking a robo van to work.

Speaker 2 I just don't really want to get hit by some robo idiot that's texting,

Speaker 2 which we know who that is. Probably my 15-year-old that just got his license.
And

Speaker 2 I have to smack that kid around. Scary.
Honest. Like, huh, disable your phone immediately every time you get in a car.
I think there's a feature for that.

Speaker 4 They have these things. This is not an ad, but if they would like to sponsor us, we would love it.
It's called a brick, and you can stick it like on the dashboard of your car, and

Speaker 4 it's like a QR code. You scan it, and it like disables all the apps on your phone.
So you can only call. So if you have an emergency, you could call.

Speaker 2 I probably should get that. Yeah, I'd stay off mind for the most part, but

Speaker 2 I'm not immune to it. And I'd rather almost just have the kind of like take the bullets out of the gun at that moment.

Speaker 2 Don't even be distracted. Yeah, and then the cool thing is.
But I want to choose to not be distracted and not have, you know, someone choose it for me. Yeah.

Speaker 4 Yeah, it's pretty cool. In other news, I have some Las Vegas Raiders news.
That's always weird to say, as somebody that is from California.

Speaker 2 LA Raiders.

Speaker 4 And grew up, yeah, grew up with them.

Speaker 2 Or Oakland Raiders.

Speaker 4 And Oakland, yeah. So Oakland used to have the Raiders and the A's, and now it has no teams.
Tom Brady and partner Tom Wagner to pay over $200 million for a stake in the Las Vegas Raiders.

Speaker 4 NFL owners approved former superstar quarterback Tom Brady as the minority owner of the Las Vegas Raiders.

Speaker 4 And I have a quote here from Tom Brady.

Speaker 4 I'm eager to contribute to the organization in any way I can, honoring the Raiders' rich tradition while finding every possible opportunity to improve our offering to fans and most importantly, win football games.

Speaker 2 Tom Brady's NFL legend Hall of Famer to be like,

Speaker 2 why do you want to own part of a team? Like, it's just that profitable to say you own part of a team?

Speaker 4 Like, I'm surprised it was this team.

Speaker 2 Yeah, i don't but probably because only it's for sale or something but or just being in las vegas i guess if you're going to buy one the most potential with all the stuff around it but i don't know like minority stake i because these these things these teams go for like three four or five billion so you know 200 million is a lot of money but that's only like i don't know 10 stake maybe eight percent

Speaker 2 What's the motivation just to say you're a minority owner? What do you think, Chris?

Speaker 3 I mean, obviously he's got a passion for the game, but I don't know anything about the profitability or margins on NFL teams. But

Speaker 3 for me, my thought would be it's probably more of an emotional investment, I would think.

Speaker 2 Yeah.

Speaker 3 You know, like staying involved in your passion.

Speaker 2 Who knows, man?

Speaker 2 I'd love to know. Yeah.
No, I think it makes money. I mean, it's very, very profitable.
I think it's both.

Speaker 3 Yeah, I think it's a profitable passion investment, probably. Maybe he feels he can help the team.

Speaker 2 I wonder if it's also like, I mean, Brady's, I don't know what his net worth is. It probably, he's probably not a billionaire, but he's not probably far off of it.

Speaker 2 And maybe it's like to eventually own the whole thing.

Speaker 4 It says that his 200 million is only 5%.

Speaker 2 Yeah,

Speaker 2 sounds right.

Speaker 2 Let's find out.

Speaker 4 His net worth

Speaker 4 is 300 million.

Speaker 2 Yeah.

Speaker 2 So

Speaker 2 4 billion to buy it. five percent i'm doing my math right so

Speaker 2 but you know what with all his deals and his clothing line that's now uh intermixed they partnered with the shoe company that i'm forgetting the name of but you know he might could get to where he could be in that territory him being involved is gonna up the valuation yeah alone you know what i mean yeah like it's already gonna appreciate for just this this article

Speaker 2 Yeah, it's a great, it's the biggest influencer deal in history.

Speaker 2 You know, but he actually paid.

Speaker 2 But his value went up because of his own name, image, and likeness, right?

Speaker 2 The team value went from 4 billion to 5 billion. So his 200 million immediately went up in value.

Speaker 3 That makes sense.

Speaker 4 I think that the Raiders will benefit from having him

Speaker 4 be a part owner of their team for sure.

Speaker 2 Yeah. I mean, you know,

Speaker 2 I've yet to see Brady tied to anything that tends to go sour. The guy is one of the greatest players in the history of the game, probably the best, definitely the best quarterback ever.

Speaker 2 And then just his work ethic and seemingly stand-up values that, as far as what I can see, I don't think it's going to hurt the organization. It's going to help.

Speaker 2 But I don't know how that translates as to wins and losses. I mean, that I will say that team has had a hard time holding success in the NFL.

Speaker 2 Yeah, they've had their moments in Oakland like 20 years ago and a blip here or there, but they're not a historical winner. Yeah.

Speaker 2 So I would agree with that as a 49ers fan.

Speaker 4 In other news, AI-related news, I thought this was an interesting article, Ryan, that you had shared. AI tongue distinguishes between Pepsi and Coke.

Speaker 4 Researchers at Penn State developed an AI-based electronic tongue using a graphene-based transitioner

Speaker 4 combined with artificial neural network. Excuse my

Speaker 2 tongue. Everybody loves a good graphene-based transistor.

Speaker 2 I got four of those at home. What about you, Chris?

Speaker 3 This is a lot of word jumble in this one.

Speaker 4 Yes, it's word salad.

Speaker 4 But basically, there's

Speaker 4 an AI tag that can distinguish between tastes, specifically Pepsi and Coke. I thought it was super interesting.
I can't even distinguish between Pepsi.

Speaker 2 I can definitely distinguish between Pepsi and Coke.

Speaker 2 Pepsi's sweeter. Coke's a little more fizzier or whatever, at least to me.

Speaker 2 I can definitely distinguish between the two. Now, Coke Zero is the bomb.
Like, it's the best of all worlds, especially Cherry Coke Zero.

Speaker 2 I'm uh, if I could only have one drink and it wasn't a beer, it would be Cherry Coke Zero.

Speaker 2 It's uh, delicious. If I knew it was healthy, I've backed off of it.
I kind of got into a dangerous spot where I was drinking like five a day

Speaker 2 and I now have one a week, like literally, that's it. One a week, but uh, I could totally tell the difference between the two.
I just think this is fascinating to me,

Speaker 2 maybe just because it's an electronic tongue,

Speaker 2 and I'm 12 years old. But, and the word salad, you know,

Speaker 2 makes me think of other salads, but

Speaker 2 we'll just stay away from there. Chris, what do you think about this AI tongue?

Speaker 2 My question is, why?

Speaker 3 Like, what, like,

Speaker 3 what's the goal here? What are are you trying to solve? What is this accomplishing? Is this for people that don't have taste buds?

Speaker 2 No, it's like for future development of food. It can help when you're

Speaker 2 as a taste tester for different things, I think, is how I would sort of see it. It mimics the human taste system.
So it will have the ability to maybe...

Speaker 2 Yeah.

Speaker 3 But I think, from my experience,

Speaker 3 everyone's individuals, what they like, what tastes good, what's bad, the level of spice or not spice. You know what I mean?

Speaker 2 It's like, it's subjective.

Speaker 3 right? How do you say like, well, this is, this is going to, if I'm developing products, which is what I assume this is for, oh, this is going to go really well.

Speaker 2 But they do, there's a norm, though. Like, there's things that taste that the majority of people think taste good.

Speaker 2 And there's always going to be individual tastes.

Speaker 2 But I think all brands taste test foods they're developing and go, okay, did at least 60% of the people that taste it go, oh, I like this taste versus that taste.

Speaker 3 Yeah. And I would think.
I'm just taking more jobs, man.

Speaker 2 Yeah. All the tastes.

Speaker 2 Stay-at-home moms, you know, taste testers or whatever they are. I don't know who's a taste tester.

Speaker 2 I've never been asked. I'd be perfect.
I'm like, I'm a good taste tester.

Speaker 4 I think that it's a little bit scary because what it reminds me of is

Speaker 4 how like chemically motivated our food processing system is. And like basically, like manufacturers of food are manufacturing not food, right? And so it will aid in that process.

Speaker 2 I just wonder, you know, if every movie is going to become reality, which it seems to, so following that track of scientific, you know, reality here,

Speaker 2 at what point are we like those movies where, you know, you go up to a Coke machine and you, you know, hit your meal of the day?

Speaker 2 Like where it's, I mean, it is probably processed food, but because like, you know, the earth runs out of certain resources or whatever. It probably does.

Speaker 2 I hope none of my family generations have to see it, but there comes a day where won't we have to rely on some amount of food engineering?

Speaker 4 I mean, you would hope not. I guess that would be a question for like the health of the topsoil and farming and like,

Speaker 4 you know, if we develop as a nation to where there's no, you know, there's cement over everything, right? And there's no farmland. I could see that happening.
Yeah.

Speaker 2 Yeah. I'm just, I don't want that to happen.

Speaker 4 But that's why it's so important to grow a garden.

Speaker 2 I've got one. He's still producing tomatoes.

Speaker 2 Nash came in yesterday with like seven. I'm like, what is going on?

Speaker 4 I still have a bunch of cucumbers in my fridge that Ryan gave me from his garden.

Speaker 2 See? Like, it's unbelievable. I can't believe

Speaker 2 how well the soil does with plutonium in it. I didn't know that would work so well.

Speaker 2 Like, what's plutonium? You're like, oh my God, I ate some of that already. No, kidding.

Speaker 4 Another AI-related article here. We got a lot of AI going on in the world, which obviously, you know, if you haven't embraced it already, it is time to embrace AI, TikTok pivoting to AI moderators.

Speaker 4 Looks like TikTok is transitioning to AI-driven content moderation, leading to nearly 500 layoffs, mainly in Malaysia.

Speaker 2 Yeah.

Speaker 2 I mean,

Speaker 2 if I had to watch TikToks all day and moderate that shit, I'd, you know, I'd just assume robot do it.

Speaker 2 I don't know.

Speaker 2 Give me the taste testing, but I don't want the

Speaker 2 moderating TikTok.

Speaker 2 It seems like a job for a good robot.

Speaker 4 I think so, too. It says definitely like more efficient, more scalable, more consistent in managing user-generated content across TikTok's global file.

Speaker 2 I think there's going to be these lines where you feel like, okay, that seems right for AI and that doesn't. Like something that's more like, this feels like right up the alley.

Speaker 3 Yeah.

Speaker 3 I mean, it's happening now on Instagram.

Speaker 2 Like

Speaker 3 the algo robot will flag me for something and I can request it and then it goes to a human and then it's up to their discretion.

Speaker 3 So

Speaker 4 yeah, the algo robots don't like me because I post a lot of Trump content.

Speaker 4 An RFK.

Speaker 3 Yeah, they don't like me either.

Speaker 2 Yeah, I don't know if they like me or not, but I just keep posting the B content.

Speaker 3 I know because I had violations this morning. I looked at like six of them.
Six.

Speaker 2 I don't have any violations. No.
And I mean, we've posted my opinion stuff, but I don't think that's it. It's vacay-related usually or like firearms related.
Yeah.

Speaker 3 Like if I'm out in the woods with a gun or something.

Speaker 2 I did get that once.

Speaker 3 I watched war videos all day of Ukraine and all that, but me with the picture deer hunting, no animal in the picture, just me and a gun is.

Speaker 2 I pictured, I was out shooting my AR probably three years ago. I remember that putting a story up about that, and that did get flagged.
It's like, come on, whatever.

Speaker 2 I'm just shooting like at a target, you know, just because it happened to me moving human, it doesn't make it that bad.

Speaker 2 Kidding. Joke.
It's a bad joke. It's joking.

Speaker 2 Entertainment. News show.

Speaker 2 No, it was a flat target on just a tree. And I was like, I think I went up up to it showing where I'd hit like a millimeter from the target.
You know, I was so proud from 20 feet.

Speaker 2 But it's

Speaker 2 important. I could hit like right on that target, 20 feet.
No, it was like 200 yards, actually.

Speaker 4 I think it's an important skill to have. You know, firearm safety, being a responsible gun owner,

Speaker 4 you know,

Speaker 4 finding and, you know, securing your own food, Chris. Good job for that.

Speaker 4 And, you know, being self-sustainable. Definitely good skills to have.

Speaker 2 Yeah.

Speaker 2 I might not be able to shoot a deer, but I'll just wrangle one up and choke it.

Speaker 3 Live it with your electric scooter.

Speaker 2 High-powered electric scooter catcher.

Speaker 2 Yeah, run right into them. Yeah.

Speaker 2 I'll shoot them.

Speaker 4 Let's see. Chris, what is going on with Bitcoin in the news today?

Speaker 3 Bitcoin's up. Last time I checked before the show, I think I saw it was up like 10% for the week.
So it's up near 67, 68,000. I think the high all time was around like 70, 71.

Speaker 3 So it's climbing back up to that.

Speaker 3 Not financial advice, but as always, it doesn't hurt to dollar cost average and invest a little bit every week or every month and just set it and forget it.

Speaker 4 Set it and forget it.

Speaker 2 All the crypto seems to be popping a little bit, doesn't it?

Speaker 2 The Dogecoin returns.

Speaker 3 Dogecoin is popping the heaviest of all of them. Elon's, you know, famed

Speaker 3 meme coin, as they call it.

Speaker 3 But yeah, the market's healthier. We're kind of in that natural upcycle now.
So

Speaker 3 I'm hoping the next couple months it just steadily kind of goes up.

Speaker 4 Maybe it's because we don't have any active storms, but I feel like we are like on the upswing with the news and business.

Speaker 2 Hopefully. Yeah.
We'll see. It's all the polling data, the early polling data, Trump's up like big.

Speaker 2 16 points. Yeah.

Speaker 2 Good. But I don't know what that means.

Speaker 2 Historically, it usually means good things, but who the hell knows? This is going to be a crazy next few weeks. Yeah.

Speaker 4 We'll see. What do we have? Four or five weeks to Election Day.
I had to approve some requests off for our team to go to their home states to vote.

Speaker 2 Yep. I was like, absolutely do it.
I will say that. You got to get out and vote people ultimately.
And, I mean,

Speaker 2 that's sort of like your American duty. You don't vote.
Who you can vote for? It doesn't matter if it's right, left. Ultimately, I'm an independent, but we know where I'm voting this time around.

Speaker 2 But it doesn't matter where you vote. But you need to go visit our partners, Independent Center, independentcenter.org.
I was actually looking at a couple of their charts.

Speaker 2 They've done polling in some of the battleground states. I was looking at that.

Speaker 2 There's like Nebraska and North Carolina, some of the places where I guess some things have been on the fence, some of the other positions that are in debate, like which ones are going to, which way it's going to go.

Speaker 2 And they think that'll swing some of the presidential stuff. And they've got all this independent voting.
They go out, they ask the tough questions. It's not right or left, pointed, slanted.

Speaker 2 It's all independent news.

Speaker 2 It's all from our partner, Independent Center. Go to independentcenter.org.
Also, the link in my bio. Sign up for the newsletter.

Speaker 2 You'll get information every week that you need to be aware of because, again, it's about policies, not parties. Go check them out, independentcenter.org.

Speaker 4 Meda

Speaker 4 Orion AR glasses.

Speaker 4 Meda unveiled Orion augmented reality glasses that project holograms and are controlled by a neural wristband using EMG technology. These glasses represent MADA's vision for the future.

Speaker 4 Vision, pun intended. Personal computing potentially replacing smartphones with more intuitive, seamless controls.

Speaker 2 Yeah, the hologram thing is interesting. You're doing really well with all the

Speaker 2 words for it. Yeah, I'm trying.
Yeah. And I mean, I don't know if it's Meta or Maida, but

Speaker 2 what did I say? Meda. That's the first time I heard like you're at your California.
I don't know if it's California accent, but like that's where.

Speaker 2 Is that a California accent?

Speaker 2 I don't know, folks. Meda.
I'd say Meta. It's Meta.
Old Meta. That's a Southern accent.

Speaker 2 Look,

Speaker 2 I don't know where all the Metaverse stuff is going to end up going, but I will say I did check this out and I was seeing the form factor and the hologram stuff was pretty cool.

Speaker 2 I still don't know how we go from this world with the smartphone and the high-def screen to this you know hologram environment that's sort of i don't know not what i consider high def necessarily but still interesting nonetheless as long as luke skywalker you know comes out you know has and i have three cpo who can like project the hologram on something with whatever it is that's what i think of i think of holograms

Speaker 4 i think of what's that movie where they it would be like off their wrists it would be like a watch and it would pop up a hologram yeah i don't know.

Speaker 2 Limitless. I do think the glasses are a lot more manageable than the freaking Apple Vision Pro.
Like these, these are like sunglasses I might actually wear. The one that

Speaker 2 was demoed on the article. So we're getting closer to a form factor, but I still don't know like the distraction of...
in your eyes while you're walking around and like how much data is coming in.

Speaker 2 Like, I guess if you're not walking around and not being distracted.

Speaker 4 It's just something Mason on our team would wear.

Speaker 4 Mason on our team is very into all of this type of stuff. I personally will not be caught wearing the AR glasses.

Speaker 2 Yeah. Chris might wear them.

Speaker 2 I could see Chris might. We'll see.

Speaker 3 Try them out. I'm with you on it.
What's the usability, right? Like, how functional is it really? Or is it something you're just kind of like sitting down using? You know?

Speaker 3 So we've talked about this, man. What was the the video game version thing with the red one with the oh, yeah,

Speaker 2 I forget the name of it?

Speaker 3 I just think back that was 30 years ago, right? And they were kind of still trying to do this in a game boy novelty,

Speaker 3 whatever it was, more novelty than actual usability.

Speaker 2 So I feel like we're

Speaker 2 like we're a solution in search of a problem.

Speaker 2 Like all this stuff, like it's like I've yet to, you know, sometimes technology comes along and it's so obvious. Like, holy shit, this.
Oh, what?

Speaker 2 Where's this been my whole life? You know, MP3 players,

Speaker 2 the smartphone itself, once it sort of got adapted and had apps, it's like, but this feels like it's, we're getting closer, maybe, because it's not the big goggles from Apple that just don't are kind of crazy unless you're sitting at home.

Speaker 2 But this is sort of like, all right, we want this to work so bad.

Speaker 2 we want this meta thing we want this virtual we got this augmented reality has to work we're gonna find something's gonna stick we're like throwing spaghetti on the wall like okay what's good right you like this oh you don't

Speaker 2 how about this like you know like me trying to like the closed eyelight for my wife i'm like you don't like this black t-shirt how about this black t-shirt

Speaker 3 it's like they're creating a solution to a problem that no one because if you went and asked people hey would you want some glasses you could wear instead most people would be like no

Speaker 2 like i'm and look and and and most innovative stuff does sometimes come along and makes you realize something

Speaker 2 but this has

Speaker 2 got a long way to go i think to finding the practicality and the in the use case from what i'm reading

Speaker 2 i'm sure someone's going to tell me that haptic feedback in the air you know is what people want to do you know play the air the air piano because you know you're seeing stuff through the glasses but

Speaker 2 it is one of those things once you're if you're doing that, people like, what the hell is that guy? You know, like they're going to be like, that guy is having a mental breakdown.

Speaker 2 And then you got a glass on, they're going to think you're like Stevie Wonder, like blind.

Speaker 2 I mean, it's like, okay,

Speaker 2 all right. We'll find it at some point, and you'll hear it here first.

Speaker 4 Yeah, I like my own reality. I'm good on the augmented reality for now.

Speaker 2 Yeah.

Speaker 2 I know someone's going to like message me or tell me, you know what the use case is for for blah, blah, blah. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah.
I know, but that's not what this is and we're not there yet.

Speaker 2 So

Speaker 2 there you have it.

Speaker 4 Alrighty, friends. Ryan, you want to close this out?

Speaker 2 Oh, that's it for today. All the news.
Any final words, Chris? Any final thoughts?

Speaker 3 Live in the real world. Enjoy it before the robots come for us.
I'll go take a nice walk or the beach. Take a hike.

Speaker 2 Yeah. We've got a cold plunge next door now.
I'm going to have to go take a cold plunge plunge after everyone.

Speaker 2 Maybe before every episode, that should be part of it. Do cold, you know, the right about now cold plunge.

Speaker 4 I'm not going to participate, but Sawyer, you in?

Speaker 2 Hell yeah.

Speaker 2 Oh, man. I got a bunch of softies around here.
I mean, I have to do my hair for those shows. I'll stay in for four minutes.
One for all. You're going to dunk your head.

Speaker 4 Okay. Okay, maybe.

Speaker 2 Discomfort is comfort. Well, sometimes.

Speaker 2 Anyway, we appreciate everyone for listening. Wherever you are, whenever you are.

Speaker 2 We don't ever know. You know, this is a topical news episode.
I think most of our audience is on the weekend.

Speaker 2 But, you know, if it's like three weeks later, you know, stay for the entertainment and maybe not the news

Speaker 2 as we fumble through all of the AI technologies, panning some and supporting others. But no matter what, we support you.
Find us at ryaniswright.com.

Speaker 2 All the highlight clips, full episodes, links to social media, Chris Burby Hanson on Instagram. Thank you, Brianna.
Thank you, Sawyer. We'll see you next time.
Right about now.

Speaker 1 This has been Right About Now with Ryan Alford, a Radcast Network production. Visit ryanisright.com for full audio and video versions of the show or to inquire about sponsorship opportunities.

Speaker 1 Thanks for listening.