5. Can't I Just Like My Stories?
2016Show notes
Transcript
Tap a timestamp or any sentence to play from there · machine transcribed (mlx:mlx-community/whisper-large-v3-turbo), expect mistakesAlexThis is Do By Friday, the weekly challenge podcast from Merlin Mann, Alex Cox and Max Temkin. This week's challenge, secure your passwords.
MaxSo I, the reason I was late today is I have, I've been frustrated over the last, I don't know, whatever, like three or four years that I've been like, you know, I have this like game company and I'm just working all the time on games that I don't ever have any time to play any games which is like of course why anyone gets into making games is they love playing games and I have like less and less time to play tabletop games and playing tabletop games is like more challenging than finding time to play video games because you need to like assemble
people and teach them the rules and unpack the game there's like a lot of like uh there's a lot of you have to like overcome a lot of friction to like start playing a tabletop game so there's this new game out people are very excited about it it's called uh sea fall by rob davio and it's a legacy game so you don't just play it once you play with the same group of people like 10 times and there's this story that unfolds and the game you you literally like open compartments and take out new pieces and add new cards like every time you play so it's the sort of living exciting adventure that you have with these people and it's getting a ton of buzz very um introverse
a very interesting somewhat controversial game design and i'm just dying to play this thing and I just decreed, I'm like, I'm fucking doing this. I'm playing a game. I'm having a game day. And I got my friends together who would tolerate playing Seafall. And we play Wednesday morning, I have everyone over at my house, and I make breakfast for everyone. And in my head, I had this vision of like, you know, the thing that I really want in my life, which is like sitting around with my friends and playing a game that I miss from like, you know, I don't know, college where, you know, I have this image fixed in my head of this like really carefree, like, oh, we got nothing to do.
Let's sit around and play a game. And, you know, we're all happy and thrilled to be here. It's it's like, I was like, I can just recreate this if I like block off this time and have everyone over and, you know, recreate those conditions. And of course it doesn't work like that at all. Like it's this like frantic, like panic of like people always try and schedule me for something on Wednesday morning. Cause they see a big open thing on my calendar. And I, I'm always up, I'm always up late the night before frantically canceling things. Cause I want to preserve my game day. I have to remind everyone to come. And then I'm like, don't have coffee. So I'm like
running out and getting ingredients to like make breakfast for people. And then everyone's there. and I'm like sweating looking at the clock because we're not going to be done in time for the podcast. So I just like, it was like a very high anxiety moment. And then compounding the problem was the turns in this game take a very fucking long time and there's nothing to do during other people's turns. So I have like 20 minute stretches with like very little to do in the game. And I just am sitting and I have subscribed to the paper New York Times. So I'm just sitting there reading the New York Times,
the front section of the New York Times watching people move their ships around these islands raiding the little colonial villages and I'm reading today's New York Times and flipping through the pages and it occurs to me I think this is the most bleak newspaper front to back I have ever read in my entire life. So that was my morning. How are you guys doing? That sounds like a fun morning. Get to spend some time with friends. And then 11.59 I stand up and I'm like, everyone needs to leave my house now.
AlexYou're like a mother during the holiday season who so frantically and perfectly prepares and just has these really great expectations. And then when your friends slash children don't meet them, you're like, get the fuck out.
MaxMy son comes home and he has a nose ring. No one's even touched my folded lamb, Cassoulet.
MerlinOh, no, you're doing... Oh, this is hard, Max. Are you doing Headspace? I saw that on your screen.
MaxI've downloaded it. I downloaded it. So I... I don't know how far you want to get into this. I downloaded...
MerlinI did it for almost three days, and I keep meaning to get back to it.
MaxSo I do meditate. Not this morning, because I was busy making breakfast. But in general, I do have a pretty good meditation practice, and I just use the timer app on the phone. And everyone's into Headspace. It's this meditation app. And I downloaded it, and I opened it up, and I saw there was microtransactions required to meditate. And I was like, I don't think this is for me. But I have to explore it more.
AlexYeah, isn't this the hot startup one? I just want a nice timer that has soothing bleep bleep music or a stream.
MerlinGod, Chicago is cranky today. Cranky Chicago. My lady friend told me about this, and so I took a look at it. She liked it. She bought the book, and she said, this guy is really good. I think he's from New Zealand.
AlexWhenever you say there's a book, I'm like, ah.
MerlinWell, you don't have to get the book, but you've got to have a franchise. You've got to build the platform. But what I liked about it, one of my favorite parts has been it is very doable. It's only a few minutes. But also he has these really cool little movies to explain to you what you're going to do. And the one for the third one that I still haven't finished yet, my favorite movie so far, is I love the way, I love hearing people explain the idea of how to do meditation, not how to sit, not where to put your hands,
but more of the ways to illustrate through analogy how to kind of fix your mind in a way that it may not be what you expected. And it includes a really good movie that just illustrates, it's basically, spoiler alert, it's kind of like watching traffic. You're just watching cars go by. You're not getting into any of the cars. You're just watching them go by. And I was like, meh, that's pretty good.
MaxBut that said, I haven't done more than two days of it. I don't know. I've spent like 10 minutes in this app, but it's like guided meditations. Like someone talks to you and kind of tells you what to do, right?
MerlinYeah, I think it's a way to ramp you into it by saying, I mean, I think it assumes zero familiarity with meditation. And honestly, I have to say, you know, I'm not sure that this is the way to become a yogi. But I think part of the problem is that people have so much baggage about what meditation is. And speaking for myself, I spent 20 years feeling like I'm doing it wrong. Like I don't have fucking Satori, dude. And like I finally, you know, got to the point where I read a couple books. And part of my problem is that like so many stupid fucking Americans, my approach to meditation is to read about it for a year before I ever actually do it and find out whether I'm doing it right.
And, you know, it's one of those things where it's like, you know, if you're going to exercise, you got to exercise. You can't keep reading about it. So I don't know. You had that as a challenge at one point, Max, and I think it's still an interesting idea.
MaxI would love to do a meditation challenge. I haven't decided which books we'll start with to study the meditation practice.
MerlinOh, we should probably do a couple episodes where we just talk about things we heard on the internet about meditation. What's the cushion called? You buy yourself a Sufi? You sit on that? Is that right? And you get a Zoftig? What's it called? I think I've got a Zumba. You get a Huppah. You get a Zoftig, Huppah. And then you put part of your butt on that. I think you're thinking of the shofar. That's right. Mazel tov. And then you've got to sit erect.
Alexwhat what's the cushion is the cushion real i want it's the it's the cushions we have in the
Maxin the little in the little japanese room they're those aren't that comfortable
Alexwe so so merlin we have these jazz break beautiful cushions to sit on in our um we have a conference room slash tea uh meditation room but every time i've ever had a meeting in there we take off the fancy cushion part and just sit on the like uh bean baggy part of it you have not you clearly
Maxhave not read the right books my other problem is i like to leave i like to lay down
Merlinand there's only one there's like a couple consistent admonishments there's a whole lot of like hey you know what don't worry if there's noise that's all part of the process hey you don't need a specific cushion but they're all like you know what don't lay down that's not meditation
Maxthat's laying down the line between napping and meditating is very fine i used to think you know
Merlini used to hear about walking meditation i read like a paragraph about that and and so i would uh used to be i'd smoke a cigar and take a walk and that's but a walking meditation it's like a
Alexworking vacation it's not really either staycation merlin were you ever shamed uh for doing what was called horizontal prayer what yeah is this a thing no it sounds like a weird sex thing i'm saying out loud no because uh uh we would always get yelled at in catholic school like you're not praying if you're horizontal like the the idea that you're supposed to pray before you go to bed but if you're in bed lying down uh it doesn't matter you gotta have uh you gotta have three
Maxfeet on the ground yep yep that's what they said that's the haze code when you're with jesus so so
AlexAre you familiar with adoration of the Eucharist?
MerlinIs that a euphemism? No. Is that an urban dictionary thing?
AlexYeah. So you sit in front of the Catholic cracker that we are supposed to believe is literally the body and blood of Christ. So you're sitting with pieces of this corpse and you're supposed to just sit and reflect. but let uh all all thoughts sinful thoughts leave leave your mind and i it took me until i was about 16 i'm like oh they just stole buddhism and put it on the white relationship now alex did they ever
Merlinspecifically tell you to hold a dime between your knees did they ever tell you that in catholic
Alexschool no it is that is that like a keep your keep your legs shut thing don't let anybody adore your Eucharist yeah yeah it was um so we would actually have our skirts measured and if you're um hot you would put you would put if you would yeah people are always like oh you went to Catholic school and you're like girl that was hot no no it wasn't our homeroom teacher would put a was it an all-girls school no it wasn't which is yeah we just had to wear skirts um but our
our homeroom teacher would put a textbook on the bottom of our knee. And if the textbook did not touch the like hem of your skirt, then it was too short. And you got it. You're really tall. Yep.
You had to buy a custom skirt.
MaxCause the textbook isn't relative based on your height.
AlexYeah, no, well it's Catholic school, Max. How much logic was applied to these rules.
MerlinIt's like, it's like a tax free fetish club. It's like, what is going on at that place? follow up all right merly what follow up do you have am i the only person who looks at the google
Alexdoc am i the syracuse of this show i i am looking at it right now um uh i did not know there was a
Maxgoogle doc but i i like the ones where we don't prepare yeah uh start us off merlin this is okay
Merlinso here's here's the thing i just want to come clean with our listeners is that is that we've been recording this show for a pretty long time and we have um several episodes that we recorded that we thought were okay that were like pretty good but we're not quite what we wanted this is actually something i counsel my kids on all the time try doing episodes of a show until you get one that you love then when you get three that you love you're probably good to go so just if there's sometimes a little bit of confusion in the episodes before this one about like when they recorded and how much max knows about uno in a given week that's because they might have been
recorded at different times and now they've come out schedules are complicated i just wanted to say because i think we stipulated this in our offline communications in our special group is that we're now ready to make this the show this is the show you're listening to the show and we're going to record episodes and we're going to put them out and unless max has some kind of tizzy because he's been reading the paper, we're probably not going to kibosh episodes and screw up the order. So I just wanted to mention that now you are officially listening to the show. Now, Alex, is it true what I've heard in our secret online communication group that you're considering at some point doing a special mashup episode of all of our odds and sods, as you say?
AlexYes. There are bits that are great from older episodes.
MaxI just want to say the bit where we're talking about the massage chairs at Gen Con is one of the funniest things we've ever recorded. And I'm not allowed to put it out. I'm cruelly prevented from sharing this hilarious moment of audio with the world.
AlexLet's put it on SoundCloud. No one will be able to find it.
MerlinOkay. And so we just wanted to come clean with that. Okay, back to follow-up. So, hey, hi, welcome to the show. And so a little bit of follow-up. Our last episode that went up was the Amazon Challenge episode. and I just wanted to mention we got a lot of requests from people to post show notes that would include links to all the many wonderful things that we sent and received to each other. We made a tactical decision not to put those in the show notes for the last episode, not out of lassitude, but out of spoilerage. We didn't want people, we wanted people to be able to enjoy the program
and without seeing what stuff was mentioned. That said, we have started putting together a Google Doc that will include all of the links. You can get your ladybugs, You can get your kitty cat death key chain. All the different things that were mentioned. You can learn how to, like Alex has been practicing cutting zip ties off herself with the shoelaces. You're going to be able to buy that product off of Amazon. I can't promise you when that will be done, but we've got maybe two thirds of those linked up. I just wanted to mention that. Lots of people asked.
AlexShould we make a Tumblr? The kids seem to want a Tumblr for this show. I think it's a great idea. Do the kids still use Tumblr? Oh, yeah.
MerlinOh, boy, the ads.
MaxThe ads. I think I got an ad for like a reverse mortgage the other day
MerlinI think I got an ad for having sex With a reverse mortgage But it was like a picture of an old guy Which would you choose? They're bad But no, we should totally do a Tumblr And then people can send us things and say Hey, put this on the Tumblr And then that could be part of Alex's job
AlexYay What? I'd be fine with that No, I think that would be very fun Alright You have a follow-up that you did receive Your Play-Doh at-at and your lube.
MerlinYeah. Yeah, this is the other follow-up. I just want to clarify. Yeah, there was basically, as soon as I finished recording the program, I walked up to my house. Don't be creepy. And yeah, there was packages from Amazon there. And I think I sent you a photo of my daughter, utterly delighted with what she now calls her library of Play-Doh. Because you were kind enough to send 36, three six cans of Play-Doh as well, as well as a really cool at-at. and she's loving that. And then another package, I got some lube from a douche.
And I realized, I think they sent me a partial douche, which is probably appropriate.
MaxI apologize.
MerlinI got the bulb, but not the tube.
MaxI hate when you're halfway in there
Merlinand you realize you don't have the tube. You know, they always say, read the directions all the way through first. Anyway, I got the lube, that's in the closet. If I ever get the rest of the douche, I'll be able to work some man webs. do people really get poop on their balls is that really a thing i've never heard of that i i don't know our our listeners have sent us some things to indicate in the dude wipes community apparently there is kind of a soda soda voce discussion that dude wipes might really be because you shit so hard they go all over your balls and your taint i get the taint i don't know how you have such an
Maxexplosive poop that you get is it okay uh are you receiving uh is it sort of a how do i put this Is it in the primary blast or is it a splashback effect? Oh, I see what you're saying. You're in a shallow bowl. It could be a deep bowl, but with a lot of... Because here's the thing is...
MerlinBecause you get travel.
MaxWell, it's mass times acceleration.
MerlinTimes acceleration, right, right, right, right. Yeah, and then so it could be poop water, but I just don't see... I mean, I've cleaned up some baby boys who make a poopy diaper, and boy, is that ever a scene, man. You've got to get into the invaginations of the ball sack I can get them all out and get the little acorn there. Total, total horror show. But I personally, I can just say as I sit here today, 50 years old, I've never shot on my balls.
AlexI mean, that's a good life. Very glad to hear that, Burla.
MaxLooking back on your life, I mean, what more can you say then? At least I've nourished. Have you used your dude wipes yet? I have. Oh, boy. I've strategically positioned them near the toilet, but it's like, when is the time? I mean, when's the right time to use a dude wipe? Really? Like, have I earned it?
MerlinDid I defecate explosively enough that I, that I really have earned the manly art of the wet wipe?
AlexOkay. I'm done. All right. Okay. Merlin our friend Zach Cage is wondering if you tried any more really bad playing any more really bad chess which was the challenge from our
Merlinlast episode I really admire that game and I I was talking with Zach no I haven't
Alexthat's okay that's okay just wondering I'm sorry
MerlinI feel bad I feel bad about that
Alexyou don't need to feel bad about not playing and not liking video games until we have the challenge episode where you have to play a lot of video games. No, you should feel bad for not reading any books.
MerlinBooks. Could it be a comic book, Max? That's not a book. What if it's about a coming of age at a camp? If it's got pictures in it, it's not a book.
MaxChallenge this week. So I've been thinking in light of recent political events, I think people have all of this energy. They feel people are afraid. They're anxious. They're very energized. They're watching the news day to day very fearfully. And people have a lot of energy and they want to do something. And that energy is getting channeled into a lot of different sources, and it's created a good amount of infighting among the left of what's helpful, what's not helpful. And people are arguing over things like, would Bernie have won? Should you wear a safety pin or not?
Should we be trying to do a recount or flip faithless electors or try and do something to stop Trump from being president? And, you know, I don't want to go too far down this rabbit hole. I certainly have my thoughts and my feelings about what's helpful. But the one thing I can point to that I think everyone should do that is unambiguously helpful and will build a good foundation for all of the work and organizing that's going to need to come in the future is to secure your personal information and to work on your physical security
and your operational security as well as your information security. Regardless of any other political action you do, that is the one thing anyone who's thinking of protesting Trump, of speaking out against Trump, of taking any sort of opposition or protest action over the next four to eight years should absolutely do. I think we've all seen the effects of people getting into your data and how easy it is and how bad that can be for you. So there are, you know, nothing is 100%.
We are not experts, but there are some, like, very common sense, simple things you can do to sort of, if you're not doing them, they will dramatically improve your operational security and your information security. So that was sort of the theme of today's challenge. And then the specific thing to do was we all used a program called a password manager, which we can get into what this all does, called 1Password. and I thought it would be an interesting exercise for us each to use this feature in 1Password called Watchtower, where Watchtower is sort of this computer program in 1Password
that analyzes all your passwords for all your services and tries to identify your vulnerabilities.
MerlinI think it's an interesting challenge. I don't know if it's a fun challenge, but I think part of it is...
AlexIt's not a fun challenge.
MerlinI think people have a very understandable resistance to giving this too much thought for a whole bunch of reasons. You know, one of the things that, so you get people like us who have a certain amount of freedom in how they get to conduct their personal and business life. The truth is, though, you look at people, you know, I bump up against this with things like money sites, bank sites, the kinds of ludicrous requirements that they have for passwords that it's all security theater. It feels safe, but it's really not.
They want you to have these security questions that are all stuff you could find on the Internet about people. There's all kinds of bizarre stuff. But then you get to stuff like your company will have this, not all companies, but many enterprises will have this policy of changing your password every so often. You can't reuse it. It can't be this close. And that ends up creating its own problem, which is that you get to people putting it on a Post-it note because they can't remember it. And they're not allowed to have a password manager. And it asks this really ludicrous thing that isn't just security theater. It's actually the opposite of useful.
It's the same kind of thinking that going to Barnes & Noble and buying yourself a password diary, like not the best idea. Maybe still better than nothing, but I guess I feel like I understand the resistance to this. My resistance to some of this is I want to understand what I'm doing when I make some of these changes. I'm reluctant to say to people, hey, go buy this app and use it. Because if they forget their master password, they're SOL because they thought about they didn't really think about that. They don't really understand how and where to use it. But my plea, and I do like your challenge, Max, because I think it's good to start thinking about this even as you're not doing all of these things.
There are some fairly not difficult, not complicated things that you could do that actually do have a big impact and are not that inconvenient. You do not have to become Snowden to do every one of these things. There are some things that are just good hygiene. A friend of mine in college used to say, you know, it keeps the honest people honest. There's no way to harden yourself against everything, but there are some things you can do that are not super difficult. And a program like 1Password, once you acquaint yourself with it, I guess some people use, what's the last pass? Is that the other big one?
I think so, yeah. But once you acquaint yourself with it, you will look back at your life before that and think it was probably a little bit crazy the way you were doing stuff.
MaxYou know, so the purpose of also of kind of discussing this on the podcast and going through it is, you know, A, I think a lot of the listeners of this podcast, they probably do have like pretty good information security And, you know, our goal is not to take people from 90 percent to 91 percent, which is really, you know, that's like actually like a huge amount of work once you have done all the easy, obvious things. But also, I just want to point out, like, if you if you can take a step back and like look at what how people are talking about politics on Twitter and, you know, in your community, people are really scared and they want something to do.
And this is a time for people who are good at computers and good at technology to say, you know, if you care about these issues, say to people, hey, this like massive state surveillance operation with no oversight or checks is about to be inherited by Donald Trump. And if that makes you uncomfortable, we should be, A, we should take a minute to think about those policies. but also B, here are some, for most people, if they haven't done any of this stuff, if they don't have two-factor, if they haven't implemented a password manager, if they haven't taken that low-hanging fruit, you can get them from 0% to 90% in like five minutes.
And this is the moment of change where people are open to a new suggestion. Does that sound more fun? Let me ask you this. Does that sound more fun if I do a little slide whistle? Oh, much better.
Let me give a two-minute, my two-minute spiel on like what I understand to be like the critical things to do to sort of like take someone like, think of like your parents, right? Who they probably don't have almost any information security or operational security. I just wanted to go over some of the big things to do and then we can end with one password and describe what a password manager is
Because actually in the scheme of things a password manager is important But it's not even the one of the top most important things to do So basically the idea of like operational security and information security they go hand in hand Operational security is like things you do to like make your household and your life more secure And information security is things you do to make your computer more secure and the reason you can't do it's very hard to do one without the other is like you can have great passwords on all your shit and two-factor and all this stuff but the way that most people get hacked like if you're someone's
really determined and they really want to hack your shit like what happened to that journalist Matt Honan they're not gonna like it's not gonna be a scene from Mr. Robot where they I have terminal open and they're like typing real fast into your computer and hacking you what they're gonna do is they're going to get on the phone and they're going to call Amazon and they're going to say, uh, hello, it's me, Merlin Mann, uh, Amazon customer. And I've forgotten my password. Can you reset it? Right. And then they get into Amazon and they can see your credit card number
because they're in Amazon. And then they can use the credit card number to authenticate into your bank. And then they can get from the bank, the address and all your information. And then they can use that to reset other stuff. It's like that, that's like a social engineering attack. So you can see where this stuff gets really complicated and interconnected. So I would just say for people, if you're thinking about your own sort of security situation or like your friends and family and people in your community, here are the immediate things you can do. Number one, you have to identify your essential services that affect your safety and your material life and separate those out from the lesser services.
So examples of that for me. My bank is like an essential service I really don't want my bank to be hacked because that would cause like material damage Someone would take all my money and then I couldn't buy groceries my phone provider. That's another one If someone ever got into my phone provider They could cause a lot of trouble for me by like cloning my number and getting my text messages or you know things like that So those are the kind of top level secure things that you can do and basically like go talk to your banker Go talk to the person at the phone store and tell them you want to add security to your account and they'll do it
They'll add additional security questions so that when you call in, you can't just say, hey, it's me, Merlin, man. They'll ask you some more stuff. And it makes it much. Stop using my name. And it makes it more. That's man with two N's. Oh, God. No, but it makes it a lot more. It makes it a lot harder for anyone to get in. That's like top level thing number one. We can get into some more little tricks and hacks I have for securing your phone account.
MerlinYou're also, I mean, this is the one everybody says, but it has to be repeated, which is stop using the same password for everything.
MaxThat's right, yeah.
MerlinAnd the reason for that is that if something happens for whatever reason, whether it's a technological failure, whether it's a hack, whatever it is, the trouble is that in the past most of us at one point in our life probably did use one to three passwords for everything, which worked fine at a certain point. But the problem is if that password is compromised and you're using the same login for everything, that's the other part of it is using different logins. It helps a lot. But just the most basic one is don't have your Yahoo and your Gmail and your Gawker account used the same password. It's in the case of Gawker, when that was breached,
that they had not, as I understand it, had not encrypted the passwords or encrypted it in such a way that people with shorter passwords, it was completely exposed. So if you had the same login and password for all those different things, you just gave them the keys to the kingdom. So, and that to me is where it does pivot to something about a password manager, which is having, if you have a three trillion year password, but you use it for everything, it's not the best idea.
MaxAbsolutely. And the other sort of top level advice I would give that's on the order of like call your bank and add security to your bank account is use two-factor authentication on your critical services. So for me, my critical services would be my email and, you know, like my Dropbox account. Like I really don't want people to get into my Dropbox account. So I have two-factor authentication. If you're the one person listening to this who doesn't know what two-factor is, that's the thing where it like texts you a code in order to log in. And that means that even if someone guesses your password or hacks your password or whatever, they also have to have your phone to get that code if the code is texted to you.
And I have also heard this would get into the more like fiddly category, but I've also heard a lot of information security people say use a third-party two-factor authenticator. So like Authy is an app for iOS.
MerlinAuthy or the, you know, you really want to be using that Google app. there's a Google app you can get that will basically give you a little code that's good for one minute to log in. But also it should be mentioned getting ahead of ourselves a little bit. You can also do this with 1Password. 1Password will let you take a picture of your QR code or whatever similar. So you could actually use 1Password to generate those codes as well. But I would say try to, if you have a choice between using SMS and something else, I would suggest probably something else if you can do it, but still better than nothing.
I mean, you know, something you know and something you have, It makes it a little bit better from what I understand.
MaxYep. Okay. So that is, you know, if someone's like, hey, how do I like increase my, you know, I'm planning to like be a protester, become politically active, and I really do not want my emails hacked like John Podesta. That is the top level advice that I would sort of give them is like if you start there, that'll take you from 0% to 90% in like an hour. Anything else, like you get marginal gains. So anything after, like, two-factor authentication, using a password manager, like adding security to your bank and your phone, that kind of a thing, you're playing for, like, to be 1% more secure, 1% harder to hack than the next guy.
But just know that there's a lot of debate about anything sort of after that and how useful it is versus how much it makes you stand out. I mean, these issues get really thorny and complicated. and there's a little bit of hubris, I think, of people who don't exactly know what they're talking about saying like, oh, I read this Medium post and here's exactly what you should do because these issues are really, really sticky and complicated. Okay, I have a information security friend who is obsessed with this,
and here's what happens when he dies. There is a hard drive in a secret bank deposit box. that is encrypted. And on it, he has all his passwords for all his shit. When he dies, his lawyer or whatever sends a letter to his next of kin telling them where to get the hard drive. So that tells them the bank deposit box they can go physically retrieve the hard drive. But the hard drive is also encrypted.
And then his lawyer also sends out separately the encryption key to the hard drive to another friend of his. and the two of them, his next of kin and the friend, have to work together to agree that it's in his best interest to both get the hard drive and decrypt it and get all the information off of it. I find that a very appealing solution if you're like, I mean, if you want to go full Snowden, I find that to be a very appealing solution. For most people, I would say, just, what does it matter? You're dead.
Yeah.
AlexI do really want just like a little implant where when I turn off all my services turn off so like you know Facebook doesn't
Maxwhy though
Speaker Abecause I don't
Maxyou'll be dead
AlexI don't know I mean I want to protect the identity of my cats I really don't know I just want a lot of implants Max that's really it
Maxhere's the thing though is like if that implant fails as often as any other piece of technology I have. I'm just going to wake up one morning and be like, you are dead. Your bank accounts have been emptied and you're locked out of Facebook and your key doesn't work to your house and you can't log into your phone and touch ID has been deleted on your computer. It's like, great, cool.
AlexI was really disappointed that Facebook did not kill me off in that bug that happened a couple of weeks ago where a bunch of accounts became memorial accounts. That was a bummer. I really wanted to die on Facebook.
MerlinFOMO. Another, I guess we'll probably talk more about 1Password. I just want to toss in one. You know, I'm not trying to present myself as any expert on this stuff. These are just things that seem like a good idea.
I think, and I guess there's going to, at some point, going to be some question about the future legality of this. I think having a VPN is not a bad idea also.
MaxI've heard, actually, not to be contrarian, But I've heard some people say that using a VPN is less secure because it's like gives – more people can – like whoever owns the VPN essentially can like see all your traffic.
MerlinOh, that's true. Well, I just – I have a thing on my phone. It's a service called Cloak that – on my iOS devices that detects whether I'm on a network that I've said is a trusted network. so and the thing is this you know most even certain like if you go to starbucks or wherever even if it needs a code for you to log in that doesn't mean it's encrypted there's a probably a pretty good chance they've got a captive portal to get you logged in but then that's probably just pretty much exposed traffic which may or may not matter to you but i just i feel better when i'm
somewhere and the hotel wi-fi comes up and i see that little vpn logo because cloak has detected that it should turn on the vpn i think things like vpns are going to be a very interesting thing to
Maxwatch in the next couple years. Yeah, I think there's a very good chance that the Trump administration, like Justice Department, like takes a hard line on things like strong encryption and VPNs and says, oh, these things are only useful if you have something to hide. And, you know, regular people shouldn't have access to like this kind of security to secure their communications. And like, you know, I could really see, you know, an attempt to almost like talk about those things as like weapons or, you know, things that, oh, well, like the terrorists want to like encrypt their emails so you shouldn't be allowed to encrypt your emails because you know
what do you have to hide are you a terrorist like I that that that kind of shit gets just I'm like so like all of my like anti-authoritarian tendencies like that just pushes my buttons so badly and um it's been tough like you know if you're if you're on the left of those issues like during the Obama administration you know I I love Obama and I've given a lot of my life to work for that guy and support him and defend him and it's been really tough like I feel like you know on those issues on that like information security stuff you know especially during that like whole
Apple you know thing where they wouldn't decrypt the phone you know it's like I sometimes I feel like I'm like out in the wilderness and I'm like I still care about this even though Obama's president and people are like oh you don't like Obama like you don't trust him as the president and it's like well it's like the thing is like I guess I sort of trust Obama with this like massive state surveillance operation and the ability to like decrypt anything or get into all my communications or whatever. But, you know, he's like a benevolent, like philosopher king that you get once in a generation. And most of the time you wind up with, you know, a President Trump or
a President Bush. And I super don't want them to read my email. Not really for any reason. I just don't want it. I just don't want Donald Trump to read my email. I just I don't feel like I need a
Alexreason for that. I just don't want him to read it. We talked about this off air a little bit, but I thought Max brought up a really great point about how really you can do all this stuff, but there's power in just scaring people.
I don't want to use the word terrorism, but I guess it did. The chilling effects. Yeah. It's kind of flipped now where the left is freaking out and previously the right was like, oh, Obama's seeing a message.
MaxYeah, suddenly the right to own guns and states' rights seem really appealing to me. I'm like, oh, I get it. I should arm myself and fight for Illinois to have stronger rights in the federal government.
AlexI'm practicing breaking out of zip ties. Whole new world.
Let's talk about something funny. I mean, so how do you feel about the last four words of Gilmore Girls, you guys?
MaxWhat is Gilmore Girls? I'm earnestly asking. No, you're not. I really am. I really don't know what it is. I know it's a TV show and it came back on Netflix. Is this the old ladies that are friends?
AlexNo, no, no, no. That is Golden Girls. That's the Golden Gilmores, yeah. Another one of my favorite television programs. But Merlin, I would like to hear a man who is twice my age describe Gilmore Girls, actually.
MerlinWell, thank you for putting it that way. You know, it's along the lines of Parks and Rec in the sense of I can tell you what might want to get you started with it, but I can't say if it's for you. It's very delightful, very fast moving, fast dialogue, delightful quirky characters, lots of fantastic music. And it's just fun. Lots of pop culture references.
MaxIf it doesn't have Anthony Hopkins giving long evil speeches about evolution and life, I don't think I can watch it.
MerlinWhy does he have two vertical wrinkles just on one side of his forehead?
MaxI read the theory once that the human intellect is like peacock feathers. Got to get back to working on our narrative. I like that show. It makes me feel very excited when I watch it. Oh my God, I love that show. That's my whole review. There's so much angst about the show. I feel good when I watch it. I think about it when I'm not watching it. It's a good fucking show. Where's the angst? There's so much Twitter backlash.
AlexI haven't seen the most recent episode. Are people mad?
MaxNo, everyone's just mad about everything all the time. I really need to get off of Twitter. I get into such a defensive crouch about every fucking thing. I went and saw Rival and then I had to like, and I wanted to say that I liked it on Twitter because I was worried that maybe people didn't know about it or wouldn't go see it. And I was like, brace for impact. I was like, I don't want to post about Arrival and then have someone say like, oh, that's like very problematic that you posted about this movie because it didn't have any Native American characters in it or something. Like, can't I just like my stories?
AlexCan't I just read a book with pictures, Max?
MaxThese goddamn SJWs ruin everything.
AlexI promise I'm going to make this episode good. It's going to be a good episode. No, leave that in. That's good. That's good shit. Oh, boy. All right.
I'm going to try to get us back on track a little bit. Do it. Merlin, you've been using Gmail for-
MaxHow dare you use Gmail instead of supporting the Dakota Pipeline protesters?
MerlinYou know how many independent email providers are struggling right now while you're using Gmail? They're losing body parts. My father built this server with his own hands out of hickory in 1769. It's been passed down one to the next. We've been running an email mill since, well, before this country was a country.
Alexyeah i really need to change my neopets password it's been there i have my like old password from
Maxlike high school that i used to use on everything i have it on like hundreds of sites it's so bad oh my god what are you doing well because here's the thing is like all my important shit that i care about is on 1Password with like a strong 30-character password. But there's so many sites that I like logged into once to like buy a piece of software or something, right?
MerlinWell, especially when you're on your fucking phone and like it won't let you use. I mean 1Password integrated into iOS is really – that's a new thing. Right. That's right. Like really being able to get to it as an extension.
MaxOh, you used to have to do like tap-tap switch and then you'd copy the – you'd go generate
Merlinpassword and copy and paste it every service pretty much everything requires a login it's either maybe they'll send you to facebook maybe they'll send you wherever luckily a lot of the better ones do integrate with one password you'll see that little the little key lock and that's an indication that it works with one password but i mean i'll go out and i'll just try some dumb service i heard about somewhere and the first thing it wants you to do is log in it's like log in for what i won't like i won't use the what the facebook login yeah something that's it's the
Maxonly thing that's available for i won't use that service i feel like i'm somehow i'm about to get fucked if i why do you want me to log in through facebook you're about to fuck me i don't want to
Alexget fucked yeah yeah well i mean the reason we're going it's like you're a lady in a bar
Maxi don't want to get fucked you want to fuck me i can see oh facebook someone's getting fucked here if i'm logging in with facebook and it's not gonna be you here's the thing here's the thing is if you it's like if you went to walmart and before you could shop they made you give them
Merlinblood you'd be like or like or like the greeter like had a cart full of bloody panties no thank
Maxyou i'll go to target i'm good it's like i don't no i don't want that you shouldn't have that let me i just came let me do my business here i don't want to give you blood i don't need that
Alexno blood no fuck no blood no fuck no service this episode is really uh clearing up my sinuses This is great.
MerlinWe've got to check in with Rich on the insulin inhaling, too. We've got to make sure we get back with him.
MaxYou know what I'm on that I realized the other day? I started using this thing, and it's been years I've been using this thing. And I'm like, why did I start using this thing? And it was from – I think it was from you, Merlin. You talked about it on our podcast. But I use these little Vicks VapoRub inhalers. They're these little white tubes, and it's got like a minty goo inside. Oh, it looks like a little weenus, and you stick it up your nose? Yeah.
You put the weenus up your nose. you you huff it and and it gives you a little it gives you a little rush it's not quite a lot sailors it's not as much as a phone delilah that's that's a good one it's no popper but it gives you a little bit of a rush and it clears you right out and it's it leaves your sinuses minty fresh and i don't i'm not addicted to these things per se but i can't stop using them or i won't be able
Merlinto breathe that doesn't mean that max that does not mean you are a priori addicted it just means
Maxyou use it a lot right and i there are consequences to me physically if i stop using it Yeah, but that doesn't mean you're addicted. No, no.
MerlinYou just like using it.
MaxNo, yeah, it makes me feel great.
MerlinDid you see the goat in the duck outfit?
MaxOh, I did. The anxiety goat. Anxiety goat. How dare we dig a hole and not get a costume for that goat?
Merlindo you know how many goats suffer in silence trick question no none of them they're bleeding all the time and look at those fucking eyes you think they're happy you put a banana hole and make a video you're not helping anybody it's that time of the year it's giveaway tuesday pound sign it's time for you to get out there and get in front of this is there a catholic charity in your area that's trying to put dimes into little girls knees why are you not helping with that why are you digging a hole what's wrong with you look at yourself i used to have so much respect for your company and all the cards that you would make that were really offensive in a way that appealed to me but now i just don't understand there there there are starving goats right now
Maxthat don't even have a duck to shit in one guy tweeted at me and i just said to him i was like it was just the one that broke me and he was like don't ever call yourself a philanthropist which is not a thing i do but he's like you're like a you're like bad for doing this and i was just like uh fucking send me your address and i'll and i'll have i'll pay to have a syrian a refugee family settled in your house and he replied back and he's like well i have a daughter and she wouldn't like that and i was like all right well stop complaining on twitter bitch
Merlinmy favorite my favorite in in universe brand related tweet to this and i don't know if it's probably one of you or maybe jen i don't know but whoever was i can't understand why you would want to take this money and dig a hole and the response was just yeah but it's a hole it was so fucking funny. It's their money. Don't give us the money. Yeah, it said they're right in the
MaxFAQs. Nobody ever reads the documentation. It's sickening. Did you guys see Doctor Strange? Yeah. It was extremely okay.
MerlinOh, it was so okay. Yeah. It was really at parts slightly less good than others, and other parts it was better than when it wasn't good, but it was really a movie. It was good, and I really don't think about it very much.
Alexuh before max leaves can we should should we recommend any resources like one password is great last pass is fine if you are a monster and have an android phone um but but who are Who would you suggest, Max, that people go to who aren't like crackpots writing medium posts?
MaxI mean, you know, it's fucking hard. There isn't the nature of this security stuff is that it's this ever. I mean, this is not helpful, but it's like this ever changing like a morass of information. You kind of need to keep up with it. And that's why I'm hesitant to give people a lot of like very timely specifics of like this week you should use this app because it happens to be secure. But, you know, if you're really paranoid, get Signal. Signal is, like, very, very reputable, encrypted sort of text message replacement situation.
A lot of my information security friends are using Signal. I use Chrome, Google Chrome, which is a pretty good secure browser. I use an ad blocker on Chrome, which not to get into the politics of ad blocking, but I don't want a lot of JavaScript, like, tracking scripts following me around the Internet. So unfortunately for all of the ad-based companies, I just block them all. And I also use a private, the EFF makes this thing called Privacy Badger, which blocks like social media tracking and ad tracking networks and things like that.
So I run both of those plugins. And then we've also talked about Use 1Password. You know, the reason I would just personally recommend 1Password over LastPass, I find them to be just a thoroughly responsive and reputable company. And I feel that they're always one step ahead of the competition in terms of transparency, openness of communication, dealing with security vulnerabilities or flaws like immediately as soon as they arise. I just could not have more faith in a company in terms of their security practices and procedures and their just integrity.
So highly endorse and recommend 1Password. And I'm trying to think if there's anything else. Oh, encrypt your hard drive using the Apple drive encryption dingus. What do they call that? Does anyone know? It's built into OS X. You just have to turn it on.
It's a lot better than it used to be. Yeah. There's no reason. Just do it. Just encrypt your hard drive. On the one hand, I don't know. What do you have to hide? But also just make it harder. Keep the honest people honest. I hate that argument so much. But it is. I mean, I get it. It's like people feel that they're like, well, you know, I feel like that about some stuff. I'm like, geez, like, do I really like I don't say anything that's like illegal or wrong. Do I need should I really be using signal?
MerlinIt's so short sighted and so self involved. And it's tantamount to saying just just follow my religion. Right. Like whatever it is that I believe, just believe it. And it's like, well, no, I mean, like you.
MaxI mean, it's here's here's here's a materialist argument for doing this stuff is like, you know, if the only people who encrypt their hard drives and use signal and are on tour are sort of dissidents and human rights cases and people who are protesting their government and, you know, Ed Snowden, then the government will be able to fucking find Snowden because he'll be the only people doing all that shit. So just the fact of having private communications will call people, vulnerable people out as sort of dissidents.
So by you saying, even though I don't really have a lot of shit going on, but nonetheless I'm going to sort of step up my security, I'm going to use a strong password. I'm going to encrypt my hard drive. I'm going to, you know, use a VPN, all that kind of stuff. You're sort of saying I will add my number to the safety of these people so that they are less conspicuous for doing it. I find that to be a very convincing, like, materialist argument. And also, like, the cost of it is so low. And the other thing is, like, okay, I get maybe I'm, like, overreacting.
And, like, it's not like the, like, trumpanistas are not going to come, like, knocking on your door and, like, drag you away to a labor camp. Like that's probably not going to happen. But like, even if it doesn't happen, like at least your information security is enhanced. So if people get mad at you on Twitter for some random thing, like it'll be harder for them to hack you. Like it's just a good thing to have in your life, regardless of what happens.
AlexI just want to mention the electronic frontier foundation, which we've kind of talked about in passing. Like I, I just love all of their resources and they have a lot of great stuff. Like if you want to go like full on Snowden and get into activism as well as like, Hey, here is how you can help your mom secure her email without putting her password on post-it note. And they're really nice. They give you stickers to put on your laptop camera. Yeah.
MerlinYeah. Come on. Come on on mine. Yeah. Looking at it right now.
MaxEFF has very, very, very good trustworthy resources. That's a great place to go for information. But, yeah, those are sort of my main – and, oh, and the obvious one I forgot is just fucking turn two-factor on everything. If you have a service that's important to you, you should basically assume that anyone can get into it, and you'll never find out if you don't have two-factor on. So if you have photos of you or, like, your kids or something, and you don't want them open to the entire world on iCloud, If you're using an iPhone, if you don't have two-factor on your iCloud,
just assume that they're basically there for the taking.
MerlinJiminy.
Here's my challenge for the next program. The next program, if you don't have a video blog, I want you to create one, and I want you to do at least three daily videos in the next seven days.
MaxThree videos on a video blog in the next seven days. Uh-huh. Okay. All right.
MerlinOkay, so I did that as a bold, brave statement because I figured you'd say no, but I didn't want to ask you first.
MaxI'm into it. I'll do it.
MerlinI got backups. You want to hear the backups?
MaxNo.
MerlinI got some really good backups.
MaxNo, I'm into this, actually. This is fun.
AlexReally? I think it has to be YouTube. and...
MerlinCan it be Vimeo?
AlexI mean, it's your challenge, Merlin.
MerlinIt's Merlin's challenge. It's your show.
AlexWell, aren't we going to get comments then? Yep. If we're putting them on YouTube? Yeah, we are. Turn the comments off. I mean, if you want to.
MerlinOh, come on.
MaxMerlin, you should do the funny bit where you talk into the wallet. Remember that? That was so funny.
MerlinThat's when I was Merlin, man. I remember that.
MaxYeah.
AlexI think just do YouTube. It's a good challenge.
MaxOh, God. That's a different thing. Do you have to start your video by saying, hey, YouTube, what up? Hey, guys.
Speaker AHey, bros.
MerlinThis week, I'm driving a car off the side of a cliff. This is my Lambo. Hi, I'm Ty Lambo.
Okay, so here's the thing. If you want to do YouTube, you can do YouTube. Here's my challenge. You have to do a video blog. You have to make a video blog. You have to give it a name. You got to do three videos between now and next Wednesday. And at least one of your videos has to be why you're quitting.
MaxBecause this is a show about current events. I'm going to get a deal by CNN by the third video or else I'm not doing this.