Podcasts about skyped

Lester Kiewit speaks with tech analyst Arthur Goldstuck, who joins from the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, to discuss the shutdown of Skype after more than two decades. They explore why Skype failed to dominate during the pandemic, the key lessons from its downfall, and how Zoom seized the moment to become the go-to video conferencing platform. Plus, Arthur shares insights into the latest innovations at MWC that could shape the future of digital communication.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Welcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: The Tech Industry is the Biggest Blocker to Meaningful AI Safety Regulations, published by Garrison on August 16, 2024 on The Effective Altruism Forum. If you enjoy this, please consider subscribing to my Substack. My latest reporting went up in The Nation yesterday: It's about the tech industry's meltdown in response to SB 1047, a California bill that would be the country's first significant attempt to mandate safety measures from developers of AI models more powerful and expensive than any yet known. Rather than summarize that story, I've added context from some past reporting as well as new reporting on two big updates from yesterday: a congressional letter asking Newsom to veto the bill and a slate of amendments. The real AI divide After spending months on my January cover story in Jacobin on the AI existential risk debates, one of my strongest conclusions was that the AI ethics crowd (focused on the tech's immediate harms) and the x-risk crowd (focused on speculative, extreme risks) should recognize their shared interests in the face of a much more powerful enemy - the tech industry: According to one estimate, the amount of money moving into AI safety start-ups and nonprofits in 2022 quadrupled since 2020, reaching $144 million. It's difficult to find an equivalent figure for the AI ethics community. However, civil society from either camp is dwarfed by industry spending. In just the first quarter of 2023, OpenSecrets reported roughly $94 million was spent on AI lobbying in the United States. LobbyControl estimated tech firms spent €113 million this year lobbying the EU, and we'll recall that hundreds of billions of dollars are being invested in the AI industry as we speak. And here's how I ended that story: The debate playing out in the public square may lead you to believe that we have to choose between addressing AI's immediate harms and its inherently speculative existential risks. And there are certainly trade-offs that require careful consideration. But when you look at the material forces at play, a different picture emerges: in one corner are trillion-dollar companies trying to make AI models more powerful and profitable; in another, you find civil society groups trying to make AI reflect values that routinely clash with profit maximization. In short, it's capitalism versus humanity. This was true at the time I published it, but honestly, it felt like momentum was on the side of the AI safety crowd, despite its huge structural disadvantages (industry has way more money and armies of seasoned lobbyists). Since then, it's become increasingly clear that meaningful federal AI safety regulations aren't happening any time soon. The Republican Majority Leader Steve Scalise promised as much in June. But it turns out Democrats would have also likely blocked any national, binding AI safety legislation. The congressional letter Yesterday, eight Democratic California Members of Congress published a letter to Gavin Newsom, asking him to veto SB 1047 if it passes the state Assembly. There are serious problems with basically every part of this letter, which I picked apart here. (Spoiler: it's full of industry talking points repackaged under congressional letterhead). Many of the signers took lots of money from tech, so it shouldn't come as too much of a surprise. I'm most disappointed to see that Silicon Valley Representative Ro Khanna is one of the signatories. Khanna had stood out to me positively in the past (like when he Skyped into The Intercept's five year anniversary party). The top signatory is Zoe Lofgren, who I wrote about in The Nation story: SB 1047 has also acquired powerful enemies on Capitol Hill. The most dangerous might be Zoe Lofgren, the ranking Democrat in the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology. Lofgren, whose district covers much of ...

In this latest episode of the Millionaire Car Salesman Podcast, join host Sean V. Bradley as he unveils game-changing strategies designed to boost engagement and conversions in your dealership and the automotive industry! Originally tailored for Toyota, this presentation showcases methodologies and technologies that any dealership and automotive professional can leverage to increase engagement, heighten the customer experience, and ultimately sell more cars! Sean begins by emphasizing the importance of diversifying communication channels, including AI, text messaging, video, and social media DMs, to outshine competitors and meet modern customer expectations. He highlights data from Podium, showing how incorporating AI-driven responses can significantly enhance engagement rates with near-instantaneous, highly detailed, and professional replies to customer inquiries. Tune in to discover how you can transform your dealership's approach to customer communication and stand out in the competitive automotive market!   Key Takeaways Utilize AI for Customer Interaction: AI and conversational AI can drastically reduce response times and increase the quality of initial customer interactions. Diversify Communication Methods: Beyond traditional phone and email, explore text messaging, video emails, video conferencing, social media DMs, and even memes and GIFs to maintain customer engagement. Invest in Text Messaging: Customers have a 98% open rate for text messages, with 95% of texts being opened within three minutes, making it a highly effective communication tool. Video Emails for Engagement: Implementing video emails post-engagement can enhance customer connection and increase appointment show rates by 75%. Creative Personalization: Tactics including memes, GIFs, handwritten notes, e-cards, and even gifts can personalize and humanize customer interactions, setting a dealership apart from its competitors.     About Sean V. Bradley: Sean V. Bradley, CSP is an entrepreneur, published best-selling author, speaker and award-winning international trainer. He is a 17-time NADA/ATD convention speaker, FranklinCovey Certified Facilitator and has earned the coveted “CSP” designation in the National Speakers Association. Sean is also a member of the elite “Million Dollar Speakers Group” in the NSA and a state association speaker and trainer. He has spoken at over 500 NCM and NADA 20 Groups. Sean started Dealer Synergy over 20 years ago, but has been in the automotive industry for over 25 years. Sean and his Dealer Synergy team are a 16-time Dealers' Choice Award Winner for being the “Best of the Best Internet Sales Trainer” and “Mobile Media Provider” in the Automotive Sales Industry.  Sean has personally trained over 100,000 Automotive Sales Professionals in 3,900 unique rooftops. However, he literally influences hundreds of thousands of professionals, in and out of the Automotive Sales industry, all over the world, through: his over 4,000 published articles, his best-selling book “Win the Game of Googleopoly”, over 9,500 videos published online, and through Radio Station soundwaves by Hosting the globally recognized Against All Odds Radio Show currently airing in Washington DC, Atlanta, Cleveland, Rochester, and Los Angeles, and the 'internet buzzing' Millionaire Car Salesman Podcast reaching over 1 million downloads! Additionally, Sean is the creator of the Millionaire Car Salesman Facebook Group, with a membership count of 28,500+ automotive professionals. Resources: Podium: Discover how Podium's innovative AI technology can unlock unparalleled efficiency and drive your dealership's sales to new heights. Visit www.podium.com/mcs to learn more! Dealer Synergy & Bradley On Demand: The automotive industry's #1 training, tracking, testing, and certification platform and consulting & accountability firm. The Millionaire Car Salesman Facebook Group: Join the #1 Mastermind Group in the Automotive Industry! With over 28,000 members, gain access to successful automotive mentors & managers, the best industry practices, & collaborate with automotive professionals from around the WORLD! Join The Millionaire Car Salesman Facebook Group today! Win the Game of Googleopoly: Unlocking the secret strategy of search engines.     The Millionaire Car Salesman Podcast is Proudly Sponsored By: Podium: Elevating Dealership Excellence with Intelligent Customer Engagement Solutions. Unlock unparalleled efficiency and drive sales with Podium's innovative AI technology, featured proudly on the Millionaire Car Salesman Podcast. Dealer Synergy: The #1 Automotive Sales Training, Consulting, and Accountability Firm in the industry! With over two decades of experience in building Internet Departments and BDCs, we have developed the most effective automotive Internet Sales, BDC, and CRM solutions. Our expertise in creating phone scripts, rebuttals, CRM action plans, strategies, and templates ensures that your dealership's tools and personnel reach their full potential. Bradley On Demand: The automotive sales industry's top Interactive Training, Tracking, Testing, and Certification Platform. Featuring LIVE Classes and over 9,000 training modules, our platform equips your dealership with everything needed to sell more cars, more often, and more profitably!     Mastering New Forms of Communication to Boost Engagement and Conversion in Auto Sales In today's competitive automotive sales landscape, leveraging innovative communication strategies is imperative for increasing engagement and conversion rates. During a dynamic presentation, Sean V. Bradley, the “Millionaire Car Salesman,” delved into emerging forms of communication designed to elevate dealership performance. This article encapsulates the key insights and provides a deep dive into the transformative potential of these strategies. Key Takeaways Speed to Lead: Utilizing advanced tools, especially AI, can ensure faster response times, increasing conversion rates significantly. Diverse Communication Mediums: Incorporating unconventional methods such as memes, GIFs, and video emails can stand out in the crowded marketplace. Technological Integration: Effective use of AI and automation streamlines processes, allowing for higher engagement without compromising personal touch.   Harnessing the Power of Conversational AI for Instant Engagement SEO Optimized Heading: The Impact of AI on Engagement and Conversion In the modern digital age, AI's role in customer communication is both revolutionary and essential. Sean Bradley emphasized the profound impact that conversational AI can have on engagement. He cited extensive data from Podium, demonstrating AI's brisk response capabilities. Bradley shared, “somebody just types in, hey, I'm looking for a black f 150. And bam. Within a minute. Something this detailed, this professional specific is done by artificial intelligence.” Artificial intelligence in dealership operations serves more than just an operational role; it becomes part of the sales strategy. By providing instant responses that are detailed and professional, AI frees up human resources to focus on more complex tasks, hence improving overall efficiency. AI tools process large data sets to generate precise and informative replies, meeting customer inquiries with unprecedented speed. Bradley noted, “AI enables machines to learn from experience and adapt to new inputs by analyzing large amounts of data and identifying patterns.” Embracing AI doesn't mean sidelining the human touch but augmenting it. AI can act as an "army of you," handling numerous inquiries simultaneously, thus ensuring no potential lead slips through the cracks.   Diversifying Communication Channels: Beyond Traditional Methods SEO Optimized Heading: Unconventional Communication Channels that Engage Exploring beyond traditional calls and emails, Bradley advocated for a diverse communication arsenal, including memes, GIFs, video emails, and even personalized text messages. These approaches cater to the ways modern consumers interact daily. Bradley acknowledged the challenge of gaining prospects' attention amid various dealership communications vying for their response. “The average dealership is not using Apple FaceTimes or memes or cash app or Venmo or animated gifs or things like that,” he remarked. This diversity is key to cutting through the noise and capturing consumers' interest through unexpected channels. For instance, incorporating memes can infuse humor into interactions, breaking the monotony of typical sales communications. An example shared was: “I have a very special set of skills to help you buy a brand new car.” Similarly, GIFs, with their visual and animated appeal, serve as an engaging way to relay messages and establish rapport, as seen with the Giphy.com resources Bradley recommended.   The Transformative Potential of Video Communication SEO Optimized Heading: Utilizing Video Emails and Calls for Higher Engagement In an era where visual content reigns supreme, Bradley underscored video communication's potency. Video emails, for instance, can significantly boost engagement rates. He mentioned, “video email increases read open rates up to 300%… once you've engaged, use video 100% of the time after engagement.” Video communication allows dealers to present a more personal touch, making interactions more memorable. By using video for appointment confirmations and follow-ups, dealerships can enhance the customer experience, making it more engaging and trustworthy. Bradley demonstrated this through examples of video email templates integrated into CRMs, showcasing their ease of use and impact. Moreover, leveraging Apple FaceTime, Skype, or Google Duo for live interactions offers a dynamic way to engage with prospects. Bradley justified this strategy, “People are not expecting to be FaceTimed or Skyped by a car salesman… you're really catching people way off guard.” This element of surprise can increase response rates and foster a more immediate connection.   Continuing Innovation and Personalized Customer Engagement Bradley's presentation highlighted the necessity of evolving beyond standard practices to thrive in automotive sales. By integrating AI for efficiency, leveraging diverse and unconventional communication mediums, and capitalizing on video technology's intimate appeal, dealerships can set themselves apart in a crowded market. The focus remains on engagement and conversion, with the primary goal being to create an enriched, responsive, and customer-centric sales environment. As Bradley articulated, “if you want the things that the average person doesn't have, you've got to be willing to do the things the average person isn't willing to do.” Incorporating these innovative strategies ensures dealerships not only stay abreast of technological advancements but also continually exceed customer expectations, driving sustained growth and success.  

Michael Jamin sits down with one of his good friends (and former bosses) Jonathan Aibel who was a movie writer for Kung Fu Panda 1-3 and has worked on other greats like Trolls, Monster Trucks, The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out of Water, and Monsters vs Aliens. If you dream of being a movie or TV writer, you won't want to miss this podcast episode!Show Notes:Jonathan Aibel IMDB: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0008743/Jonathan Aibel EMMYS: https://www.emmys.com/bios/jonathan-aibelJonathan Aibel Rotten Tomatoes: https://www.rottentomatoes.com/celebrity/jonathan_aibelMichael's Online Screenwriting Course - https://michaeljamin.com/courseFree Screenwriting Lesson - https://michaeljamin.com/freeJoin My Watchlist - https://michaeljamin.com/watchlistAutogenerated Transcript:Jonathan Aibel (00:00:00):We knew storyboards, we knew how to read storyboards. We knew what happens in an editing room and how actors perform, right? So we came to it with production skills or an, an understanding of the process that that helped us come in and say, oh, I think you can, you can cut a few frames there and actually know what we were talking about.Michael Jamin (00:00:23):You're listening to Screenwriters. Need to Hear This with Michael Jamin. Hey everyone. Welcome to Screenwriters. Need to hear this. I'm Michael Jamin, and I got a great guest for you today. This is my, this is one of my, this is one of my first bosses, actually. And yeah, yeah, John, it's true. I am here with John Abel one of the partner, he, his partners Glen Berger. I'll have him on in a future episode. So tell him to just relax. I know he wants toJonathan Aibel (00:00:51):Be, let's see how this goesMichael Jamin (00:00:52):First. Yeah, he'll, exactly. So yeah, and this guy's got a ton of credit. We, he's a real life movie writer. So let me give, I'm gonna sell you a, I'm gonna sell you, John, and then I'll let you talk for a second. But first let me talk, let me sell you up.Jonathan Aibel (00:01:04):That's fine.Michael Jamin (00:01:04):Proof everyone knows, like, I'm a, people say I'm a good creative writer. Wrong. I'm gonna prove it by selling you here, by building you up. So he's written on a u s a, he wrote run on King of the Hill for many years, including he was the showrunner, season five, cos Showrunner Mar. He also worked on Married to the Kelly's. That was his tv. That was his run in TV, I think. And then he went on to write Kung fu Panda, Kung fu Panda two, Kung fu Panda three proving like, you know, milking that thing, just milking that Kung fu panda thing. And then trolls, monster Trucks. And you've had a couple, couple upcoming stuff I want to talk about. Jonathan Abel, welcome to the show.Jonathan Aibel (00:01:46):Thank you. That was okay.Michael Jamin (00:01:48):What wasn't good? What should I have said?Jonathan Aibel (00:01:49):Well, you, king of the Hill is six years and like, that was six six. That was great TV. And then, and then you kinda mentioned some things. I was on six weeks with the same,Michael Jamin (00:01:59):Yeah,Jonathan Aibel (00:02:00):The same emphasis.Michael Jamin (00:02:01):I'm pretty sure, but I'm pretty sure. So they're not equal, you're saying, you're saying, well,Jonathan Aibel (00:02:07):You know, some, some are hits and some are are learning experiences. I'mMichael Jamin (00:02:12):Wearing my shirt for you by the, my King of the Hilter. But let, lemme tell you something. Let me tell you let me tell you something else. So will you, you guys, you and your partner Glenn hired basically, hi. You and Richard Pell hired us to be on King of the Hill. I think there was an opening because of Paul Lieberstein who left. And we literally took his office. So I credit I thank you for that. Oh, you'reJonathan Aibel (00:02:30):Welcome.Michael Jamin (00:02:31):When we got, when we joined the show, it was like, you know, it's your responsibility to get up to speed. So I asked for every script that was written or every, you know, anything on DVD that was already shot. And I distinctly remember reading all your guys' scripts, you and you and Glen Scripps, and just thinking, man, every script you wrote was just tight. It was so tight. And you'd come outta the box with a big joke. And it was just so well written. And like, you know, I didn't, there was 20 writers in the show, but I remember that your, your scripts always stood out like, man, these are always,Jonathan Aibel (00:03:02):You know, IMichael Jamin (00:03:03):Appreciate that. Always good. Yeah.Jonathan Aibel (00:03:04):I also appreciate your your diligence.Michael Jamin (00:03:07):My diligenceJonathan Aibel (00:03:08):Well, to come into a job and say, let me read everything. Lemme seeMichael Jamin (00:03:12):Everything. Oh, is, I didn'tJonathan Aibel (00:03:13):Think that was, it was a bit of a challenge with a hundred episodes.Michael Jamin (00:03:16):Always dreadful. The whole thing was a horrible experience. It's a lot to, but I remember. But you have to do it. You have to. That's how you get the voice of the characters and but the, to like, what kind of show episodes are being told. I remember, I dunno if I ever told you this, but I remember we had just, we were on just Shoot Me, you know, for the first four years. And I remember after the first season, king of the Hill was up against to shoot me. And I remember I was actually house-sitting for Steve Levitan for some reason. And and we were watching, I, we threw a big party. He, he wasn't in the house. And, and we were watching King of the Hill. It just came on. It was the, it was, you know, the Bobby's falls in love with the, with the dummy. And I, and I remember watching thinking, oh no, this is the competition. , this is really good Jonathan Aibel (00:04:01):That we used to watch. Just shoot me all the time in the writer's room feel that same way.Michael Jamin (00:04:06):Is that right? I didn't know that. I don't, I don't think so,Jonathan Aibel (00:04:08):But I, I just feels like it would, it should be.Michael Jamin (00:04:11):Yeah. You, you actually used to reciprocate.Jonathan Aibel (00:04:13):That'd be a nice thing to say.Michael Jamin (00:04:14):It would've been. But yeah, so Damn, Michelle was, and I still get, I, even today I get a ton of compliments on, on King of Hill. But tell me more. Tell me how you broken. How did you guys even get on King of Hill Hill?Jonathan Aibel (00:04:28):We were very lucky in that before we even moved to California, we, Glen and I met, we were management consultants and we met someone at this consulting firm who was college roommate with Greg Daniel's wife. And when we first started thinking maybe we don't wanna be consultants and would prefer to be comedy writers, she said, you should talk to Suzanne. Give her a call. So we called Suzanne to say, could we, we know you're Frank, could we talk to you about writing? And she said, you really wanna talk to my husband? So she put Greg on the phone. He didn't know who we were. We, he then I, whatMichael Jamin (00:05:11):Was Greg doing at that time?Jonathan Aibel (00:05:13):He had moved to la I think he was doing Seinfeld at the time or had done the freelance, the parking spot on Seinfeld. Oh, I didn't, yeah, he'd come off of snl.Michael Jamin (00:05:24):Right.Jonathan Aibel (00:05:25):And he gave the most basic advice that now you would probably give people, or you'd Google this. And it was, and Glen wrote it down, it was moved to Los Angeles. Mm-Hmm. . Okay, okay. What else do we need to do? Like the how do you become a writer? And just super helpful in that regard. And then we moved to LA and never ran into him until King of the Hill. We had our first meeting and Glenn, I think he may have brought the pad and said, it's your fault. We're here.Michael Jamin (00:06:00):But how did you get the meetingJonathan Aibel (00:06:02):That, that it was just through our agent. There's this new show starting up, it's animated. I don't wanna do animation. I know, I know. And it's non gild. Yeah,Michael Jamin (00:06:12):I know aboutJonathan Aibel (00:06:13):That. And you're gonna work in a full year for 12 episodes. Mm-Hmm. . Well, this sounds terrible, but it's Greg, it's Mike Judge who's coming off of Beavis and Butthead. Mm-Hmm. . And you will learn a lot whether it's a hit or not. And we thought, well, that's probably the best reason to, to take a job. There's nothing to see. There was no pilot even, there's just a script. Right. There are no voices to listen to. It had been cast. So it was really just going under the assumption that, well, anytime you think something's gonna be a hit, it never is. So let's take a job just based on the people. And I don't think at that moment we had there, it wasn't like, do we take this or do we take this? It was, well, do we take this or do we just hang on? And, but you had no, I think maybe we hadn't,Michael Jamin (00:07:04):You didn't have any other credits before that, did you?Jonathan Aibel (00:07:06):No, we had done, we started off, oh, we did an episode of the George Carlin show. We had done, youMichael Jamin (00:07:13):Were right down the hall from me. I didn't know that. Cause I was a pa.Jonathan Aibel (00:07:15):Right. Well, we had done a freelance. A freelance,Michael Jamin (00:07:17):Doesn't matter. You were in the Warner Brothers building, building 1 22 or something. Cuz that's where it was.Jonathan Aibel (00:07:21):Well, here. No, cuz here's our great George Carlin story is that we wrote this script for Sam Simon. Right. We turned it in. We get a call a few weeks later from someone at the studio who said, great episode. And we said, oh, you read the script. Well read the script. Did tape last night.Michael Jamin (00:07:42): just slapping the face. Yeah.Jonathan Aibel (00:07:47):We were not invited to our own tape. So we watched, we had a party, we watched it at home. Look, our first, our first big creditMichael Jamin (00:07:54):That, but that's amazing too. How did you get, how did you pitch that? You're skipping all this good stuff.Jonathan Aibel (00:07:59):Ah, our agent just back then we were, we were new. I think we had a couple, we've done a, a sketch show on Nickelodeon that got us in the guild that got us an agent. And interesting. He just put us up for stuff. So one of them was this freelance of of Carlin. And one of the other things is we went to pitch Sam mm-hmm. , who it was, it was a hazard. Like he had a deadly sharp throwing stars on his table. So you'd go to like, oh, what's the paperwork? Don't touch those. They were razor sharp. And he also had a couple vicious dobermansMichael Jamin (00:08:42):In the office. Yeah, I remember that. I remember that.Jonathan Aibel (00:08:44):Then he also had, what we assumed was his story editor sitting at the table as we pitched him some story ideas. And then we left and realized, no, that was his next meeting. The next writer who's gonna pitch story idea sat at the table while we pitched ours. And then we left. And he stayed and pitched his,Michael Jamin (00:09:02):That's a littleJonathan Aibel (00:09:03):Unusual. It was a very, it was, it was a very odd thing. But that worked out in the sense that we got the freelanceMichael Jamin (00:09:10):Your scripts must have been very good then. I mean, cuzJonathan Aibel (00:09:13):I don't think they, I don't think so.Michael Jamin (00:09:15):It must have been if you would've got an agent that easily and got to be able to pitch these shows.Jonathan Aibel (00:09:19):Well, the, the agent, I don't know if it was easy. We, well, what happened was what Mo what happens to most people is you come out and you think, we need to find an agent. We need to get an agent. We're not gonna get a job without an agent. Right. And then you meet all these agents, they love you, they love your stuff, and they say, get a job. I'm happy to sign you.Michael Jamin (00:09:37):Yes.Jonathan Aibel (00:09:38):And we realized we're not going to get work, but just an agent. We need to get work somehow. And just by knowing people, talking to people, we wound up at M T V. Mm-Hmm. doing a game show.Michael Jamin (00:09:54):Which show was that?Jonathan Aibel (00:09:55):It was called Trashed. Think It finally Made it there. We just worked on the pilot and then got to know people on the, on the hallway. We share, we were in damn TV buildings. And next door were some writers on this Nickelodeon show. And a couple of the writers had just left. And someone said, oh, I hear they're, they're looking to hire. Wow. So we said, Hey, we, we've got sketches. Can we, can we meet? We the executive producer read our stuff, met with us, and said, yeah, I'll hire these guys. We went to our agent, the, the potential agent, and said, we just got offered a guild job. Do you wanna represent us? You, there's no negotiation other than you say, yeah, I think I can get my boss to sign you. Sure. And that was it. And then we were in the Guild. We were having fun writing, and I had had credits, but I, I wouldn't say we necessarily knew how to write. We knew how to be funny and come up with gags mm-hmm. . But the idea of how do you write a scene, how to you write a script was right. Was a little bit mysterious.Michael Jamin (00:11:01):But, and so you, I so you met Glen, you were just, you were, he was a coworker at when you were in your consulting firm. And then how did you both, like, did you, so you never even dreamed as a kid of being a writer. It was ne like, how did this come out of, where did this come from? This writing thing?Jonathan Aibel (00:11:14):I don't think I had any idea that people wrote for a living.Michael Jamin (00:11:20):Mm-Hmm. .Jonathan Aibel (00:11:22):Like, you didn't, you'd watch shows and you wouldn't think, I don't, I don't really know what I was thinking. Like, if I went to see a play on Broadway, I knew a human had written it, but there's something about TV where you would think like, I don't know, those are characters who would say these words and you don't think of 10 people in a room writing those words. So it wasn't until Stimson's and Seinfeld started breaking through that, I started feeling like, whoa, there's TV here that I'd wanna write. And later I found out it was because people just a few years ahead of me at Harvard,Michael Jamin (00:12:01):Right.Jonathan Aibel (00:12:01):Were writing those shows. So I was sort of thinking like, why does this feel like it's my sensibility without realizing I was kind of swimming in the same waterMichael Jamin (00:12:09):They had? You weren't on the Lampoon then. No.Jonathan Aibel (00:12:11):You didn't have a no idea that this is something,Michael Jamin (00:12:14):How did you know you were funny then? Like, you know, IJonathan Aibel (00:12:18):Mean, I, I think I always had a sense of humor and was known for being funny slash maybe sometimes disruptive, but cleverly disruptive in school. Right. Like, I was, I'd done musical theater, so I was okay fam like, I, I wasn't like unfamiliar with entertainment.Michael Jamin (00:12:40):Right.Jonathan Aibel (00:12:42):But that was different from thinking, you know, that's something you can make a living at. And then it was right around that time where these articles started coming out about the number of people who had gone from the East coast to LA and how many Letterman writers.Michael Jamin (00:12:56):Yeah.Jonathan Aibel (00:12:56):And SNL writers and Simpson's writer and Seinfeld and Frazier and Cheers and all these. That opened up my eyes to wait a minute, this is, you could make a living,Michael Jamin (00:13:07):But when you,Jonathan Aibel (00:13:07):I went to, I had no idea.Michael Jamin (00:13:09):When you quit your job, then you came to LA you'd had no job. Right. You were what? You were just like, I'm gonna live off my savings. Or what would you do?Jonathan Aibel (00:13:16):Right. We, we, we saved up from, I I, I think Glen says he sent away for grad school applications. His second day of work is how, how quickly he knew that place wasn't for him.Michael Jamin (00:13:30):He did it just .Jonathan Aibel (00:13:32):It was a little, a little later in the process, but we started writing at night. Like we found out you gotta write a specMichael Jamin (00:13:40):Script. Right. And you guys are roommates too?Jonathan Aibel (00:13:43):No. No. We, we weren't, but we wouldn't sometimes call in sick and then work on ourMichael Jamin (00:13:48):Right.Jonathan Aibel (00:13:49):Ourselves or Glen would stay home and, and turn the light onto my cubicle and put a Right. Put my suit jacket over my chair. , you know, it wasMichael Jamin (00:13:58):All these, oh my God. Jonathan Aibel (00:14:00):Our heart wasn't really in it, but we stayed and did the job and, and saved up.Michael Jamin (00:14:05):Right.Jonathan Aibel (00:14:06):So that we could move to LA And we didn't move out to LA like I think we were, we approached it, the way we approached consulting, which was this, this was my job as a consultant, was I was given a list of doctors and it, we had sent them a survey and it was go down this list, call each doctor's office and ask them if they filled out the survey. So it's like, hello, Dr. Levine, my name is John Avon. I'm calling on behalf of this. And we've sent a survey. I was just wondering if you had a chance to, to, and I would just have to do that for hours. And the skill it taught me was just pick up the phone and call people.Michael Jamin (00:14:47):Right.Jonathan Aibel (00:14:47):So when we were thinking of moving to LA, it was, oh, you should like calling Suzanne.Michael Jamin (00:14:53):Right.Jonathan Aibel (00:14:54):Instead of saying, ah, she doesn't know me. It was just, okay, she's just like a doctor. I'm calling you. She doesn't want to talk to me. She'll just, you weren'tMichael Jamin (00:15:01):To call, were intimidated at all. You, you had, you weren't intimidated at all.Jonathan Aibel (00:15:04):I don't think I knew to be intimidated. We were in Boston at the time,Michael Jamin (00:15:08):UhhuhJonathan Aibel (00:15:09):. We didn't, you weren't surrounded by people who had this dream of going to Hollywood and then came home with their tail between their legs and said, now it's awful out there. Right. It was, that place seems fun and sunshine and I knew people, people from school, people, friends of my brothers had lived were, were out there. So when we showed up, it felt like there was a, a group, there was a, you weren't alone. It was there other people here pursuing the dream, but not so many that you felt like there's no chance this is gonna happen. Like we were, I don't know if cocky is the word, but because we didn't know any better. We were just know it's gonna work outMichael Jamin (00:15:48):And itJonathan Aibel (00:15:49):We're gonna, we didn'tMichael Jamin (00:15:49):How long did it take for you to get work, but when you moved out here, it sounds like a fa it was fast.Jonathan Aibel (00:15:53):Well, we moved out in September and we got the game show started in December. And then I think amazing by the following summer we were on the Nickelodeon show.Michael Jamin (00:16:07):What show was that? What was thatJonathan Aibel (00:16:08):Called? It was called Roundhouse.Michael Jamin (00:16:10):I don't know that one.Jonathan Aibel (00:16:11):Right. Bruce Bruce Gowers who just passed away two days ago. Who did The Queen, the Bohemian Rapley video. He was the director of it.Michael Jamin (00:16:19):Oh wow.Jonathan Aibel (00:16:20):But there's a little little roundhouse trivia. It was really fun. It was a lot of in living color writers.Michael Jamin (00:16:25):Wow.Jonathan Aibel (00:16:26):Between gigs were there. So it had dancing and original music and it was a sketch show for tweens on on sncc.Michael Jamin (00:16:36):Sncc. Is that what it was? Really? Yeah. It's so funny cuz this show here was on Nick at night, which was supposed to be not Nickelodeon and Nick at night. No, it'sJonathan Aibel (00:16:43):Different.Michael Jamin (00:16:44):But it's not because it, Nick, I don't remember if Nick at night started at 8:00 PM or 9:00 PM or whatever. But see, my, my partner I siever it used to say, but it's the, it's the babysitting channel up until, you know, 8 0 1 and then it becomes racy. But the parents don't know thatJonathan Aibel (00:17:00):. Right. no one's turning you.Michael Jamin (00:17:02):Yeah. So the, we got a lot of peopleJonathan Aibel (00:17:04):From was Saturday night. Saturday night. Nick is a whole otherMichael Jamin (00:17:07):Ball game. Oh, is that what that is? Sncc? Yeah.Jonathan Aibel (00:17:10):I guess they could have also done it Sunday without changing the name. Yeah. But it was SaturdayMichael Jamin (00:17:15):Or Wednesdays. Wednesdays or Thursdays. Anything, any day that ends with an sJonathan Aibel (00:17:23):That's true. Wednesday, Wednesdays Nick.Michael Jamin (00:17:25):Yeah. Anyway, that's why we're not in the marketing department.Jonathan Aibel (00:17:29):My point though is by the time we got to King of the HillMichael Jamin (00:17:32):Yeah.Jonathan Aibel (00:17:34):We had had, we had worked on a, a show that was real old school in its joke telling, like real strong set up three a page, boom, boom, boom, boom. Then we worked on another show that was very emotional where it was single woman in the city kind of show. And that was, it wasn't, not funny, but it was as a writer there it was, wait a minute, I'm supposed to tell a story that isn't just the situation of situation comedy. It wasn't just the character loses her driver's license and has to go to the D M V and this crazy stuff happens. Mm-Hmm. , it was thinking about the, the internal life and they're Okay. That's an interesting then,Michael Jamin (00:18:23):But then when did you learn actually how to write like story, a story structure? When did, is that King of the Hill?Jonathan Aibel (00:18:29):I think so. The other, the, the show that was very joke heavy. The other thing you learn on a joke heavy show is, is the, the tricks. The okay, someone comes in and says something and then at the end of the scene someone repeats it in a callback andMichael Jamin (00:18:44):Right, right.Jonathan Aibel (00:18:45):Then people laugh and the music plays and you dissolve slowly to the next scene. And they're, they're like they're like weapons. They could be in that they could be used for good or evil.Michael Jamin (00:18:55):Right. Right. SoJonathan Aibel (00:18:57):By the time though, we got to King of the Hill, I remember pitching the very first week to Greg and you just have no idea what this show you're thinking the Simpson. So, okay. I remember we pitched something like Dale's an exterminator. So he tens a big house and then people think it's a circus and starts showing up at it.Michael Jamin (00:19:19):Oh, I like thatJonathan Aibel (00:19:20):. And Greg's like, oh, that's the little, probably by season eight that would've been a season eight idea. That's good. But in the beginning I think that's a little not observational enough. And, and, and it's sort of like, well what do you mean to define observational was the, the question like how do you find comedy out of human, actual human behavior?Michael Jamin (00:19:48):Right.Jonathan Aibel (00:19:48):In the way, how do you observe what a person would do in a, in a real life situation? And no one had really done that in animation, which was Yeah. The, I think the brilliance of Mike and Greg was to say, well, what if you take this style that's associated with unreality Right. And give it more reality than anything else you've seen in animation.Michael Jamin (00:20:09):And that's what was unusual because we used to say in many ways just king of the Hill was less of a cartoon than, than just shooting me. I mean, just shoot me was more of a cartoon. You know, it was, but, and it's unusual cause you'd say, I I even back then I was like, well why is this show animated? Like, cuz you no one's eyes popping out, no one's running on air. You know, no one's doing any Daffy Duck stuff. But I guess it was just because you could shoot it like a movie and it could be real. But you didn't have the, you didn't have the budget. WellJonathan Aibel (00:20:39):You're probably overthinking it cuz it was just the real reason is they had to deal with Mike and Mike's an animator and this is what he wanted to do.Michael Jamin (00:20:46):. I guess so. But usually why is it animated? Like, you know, otherJonathan Aibel (00:20:50):Than because Yeah. That's, that's why are, why are, why is this? It's cuz cuz Mike wanted, he saw it. No, that was his thing. And, and he didn't. And, and that's great. That's as, that's as good a reason. And how,Michael Jamin (00:21:04):How much was, and I've heard stories, but I think people wanna hear this. How involved was Mike like literally on a day-to-day basis in those early years with the show?Jonathan Aibel (00:21:13):Huh. I can't say I know the full scope of it because I'm sure he was more involved in the production,Michael Jamin (00:21:22):But he wasn't in the writer's room. I mean, I know like,Jonathan Aibel (00:21:24):No, cuz he was living in Texas.Michael Jamin (00:21:26):Right.Jonathan Aibel (00:21:27):So he would come in and then we would do the story retreats, maybe you remember. Yeah. Or we'd go to Texas and and meet with him, or he would come in or we'd go to his house. It re it was Greg on the day today. And then I don't really know what the, the communication between the two of them was. Right. I, I'm pretty sure Mike's deal was, I have a life in Texas and I don't wanna move to LA and do this grind cuz he had done that grind for Beefs and, but, and the Beavers and Butthead movie.Michael Jamin (00:22:01):Right, right.Jonathan Aibel (00:22:03):So I think that's what Greg took on.Michael Jamin (00:22:06):But yeah, he,Jonathan Aibel (00:22:06):It was a great combination.Michael Jamin (00:22:08):He have notes though. He I remember, you know, even on on the, on the audio track, you could sometimes hear him say, I'm, that that line's not right. He'd tweak a line or whatever, you know? Yeah, yeah.Jonathan Aibel (00:22:19):Yeah, you get his little I'm not gonna say that. How aboutMichael Jamin (00:22:23): not gonna do that. But, but then, okay, so then you guys rose up to the ranks cuz only in five or six years you were running the show, which is a pretty fast climb to be able to run a TV show after only that short amount of time is kind of crazy almost. You know, IJonathan Aibel (00:22:38):Think we were a and meanwhile feels like, oh, we're not getting anywhere in this town. And some of that is because you do a show. We were, we'd probably done a year of it worked under the year before it even premiered. Right. So you're putting all this into it and you don't know if it's gonna be a hit. And then the surprise was, it, it was doing really well. And then you have no time to enjoy it because you're halfway through starting season two. It was, it was both really exciting and just crazy exhausting. And itMichael Jamin (00:23:12):Was,Jonathan Aibel (00:23:13):Yeah. Like 3:00 AM And that's sort of fun sometimesMichael Jamin (00:23:19):When you're young, it's inJonathan Aibel (00:23:21):The beginning where it's, hey, it's like college, right? We're all hanging out. We're just being funny. And then you start dating and your partners saying, what time are you gonna be home? I don't know. Yeah. Or what time do you think I really, I don't know. Someone could come into this room in two minutes and say, we're good. Go home. Or someone could come in in two minutes and say, I just got Mike's notes. We need to start over. Yeah. You don't know. And that's a, when you're a staff writer, not so hard because you just do what you're told when as you move up and take on more responsibility. It, it definitely became less fun. Aspects of it were fun. Mm-Hmm. directing actors was really fun. Mm-Hmm. working with editing and storyboard artists and the animation directors fun. But the more stuff like, can I go to a dentist appointment on Wednesday? Let me see what's the staff, what, what room am I in today? Like, I, I left consulting because I didn't wanna be a, a manager. And that's wh part of show running is that, and for us, that was the, that wasn't the fun part. The fun part, as we say, Glenn and I would note you rise up and become a showrunner based on the strength of your writing. And then you get to a position where you don't have time to write anymore.Michael Jamin (00:24:41):Oh. It's not only that people, cause I people, they reach out to me all the time, you know, that I wanna be a showrunner. It's like, I just wanted to be a writer. Like, cuz be a show. It's like you just said, you, none of us become comedy writers because we wanna be managers. Like that's not, and when you're a show owner, that's what you're doing. You are managing other people. Yeah. And and, and we're not equipped, we're not prepared for it. And we don't necessarily even want to do that. And, you know, it's a, it's a, it's a hardJonathan Aibel (00:25:06):Leap. Right. And it was, it was definitely challenging also, cuz you're putting all this work in, then you realize, this isn't even my show. This is Greg and Mike's vision, and you're just trying to fulfill their vision. Right.(00:25:21):Like, I can see running my, if Im running my own show saying I love this idea and this is my baby and I'm gonna protect. And I just, I want to be the ur here. I want to see my vision through. But so much of show running isn't that at all? It's, it's, Greg would describe it as it's sort of like pottery where you would make a pot, put it on the shelf and all right, what's the next one? Sometimes they break, sometimes they're not quite formed. But you don't have time. You gotta get to the next Right. Get to make another pot.Michael Jamin (00:25:53):But do you have, and I wanna get to your film career, which is very impressive, but do you have, did you have any like, eyes to go back and do any kind of television, even creating your own show?Jonathan Aibel (00:26:03):We, after King of the Hill, we, we wrote a few pilots. We were at Fox and writing pilots. And it was a weird time in TV where every year Fox would say, we don't want single camera shows. We need, we need Multicam, we need to pair them with whateverMichael Jamin (00:26:20):Right.Jonathan Aibel (00:26:21):Hit they had there. We need another, we need to pair this. So we'd write a multi cam and then they would only pick up single camera shows. But I think that happened two or three years or whatMichael Jamin (00:26:29):Yeah. What's,Jonathan Aibel (00:26:30):What's going on? So we started realizing, I, I think we were kind of spoiled by King of the Hill. It was, it was just creatively, it was just an amazing show. And so fun to write those characters and work with those actors and work with that staff that after that it was, I don't, it's hard to just go and do sitcoms. I mean, like, I enjoyed the form, but I couldn't see myself spending 10 more years doing that. And it felt like the the air was coming out of that format.Michael Jamin (00:27:07):Then how did you, how did you jump into features?Jonathan Aibel (00:27:10):Well, it started because King, as I mentioned, king of the Hill was not a guild go in the first years mm-hmm. . So we're doing it, we're in our second or third year, and we realized we're gonna lose our health insurance. What, what? I mean like, it was a very adult sounding realization of, oh, health insurance. What I, I hadn't even been thinking. Because when you're in the Writer's Guild, it's amazing. On a time I was 23, I had health insurance.Michael Jamin (00:27:40):But you had health through the Animators Guild though, through tag.Jonathan Aibel (00:27:43):We weren't animated animation. We were No, it was not unfamiliarMichael Jamin (00:27:47):Anybody. Oh no. Wow. I didn't know that.Jonathan Aibel (00:27:51):So we said to our agent, we need, we need either freelance episodesMichael Jamin (00:28:00):Mm-Hmm. Jonathan Aibel (00:28:01):Or we need to write a feature. And she said, well, do you have a feature spec? And we said, no. And then, and to her credit, she said, there's this director, he's been hired to direct a reboot of Freddy, or of Friday, it was Freddy versus Jason.Michael Jamin (00:28:20):Mm-Hmm. .Jonathan Aibel (00:28:21):And he loves King of the Hill. And basically it was, can you give him a fun, fun, he's got an idea for story fun characters that he can then kill. Like it was right around Scream had come out. So there was this, the, the Birth of Hard comedy.Michael Jamin (00:28:38):Right.Jonathan Aibel (00:28:39):So he said, yeah, we can do that. And we, we met him, we got along, he loved the show. We, we love working with him. So we wrote this script, which then, which then didn't get produced. But it was, oh, this features is kind of like writing King of the Hill, but longer.Michael Jamin (00:28:59):Right.Jonathan Aibel (00:28:59):You just kind of write King of the Hill and then you keep writing and keep writing and then you have a hundred pages of King of the Hill instead of 22. Right. But the three act structures similar. And the idea of thinking about a character and how do you write a character, we realized it's kind of more cinematic than episodic television. Like the things we were learning were more applicable to writing features than writing sitcoms at that point.Michael Jamin (00:29:28):Yeah.Jonathan Aibel (00:29:29):So when our television deal was nearing its clothes, and we were thinking, do we renew it? Do we throw our hats out there as, as showrunners for hire? And we thought, you know, let's, let's write, maybe we can write some more features. And we just started getting some rewrites, doing some originals.Michael Jamin (00:29:50):Mm-Hmm. .Jonathan Aibel (00:29:52):And you can start making a, a decent living writing movies and never get made.Michael Jamin (00:29:57):Oh, for sure. At least you could then. I don't know if it's nowJonathan Aibel (00:29:59):Yes. Yes. Then you then you could. But it was super frustrating. Yeah. Because everything would be about to go and then there would be a reason mm-hmm. it wouldn't go. And there were none of those reasons were under your control. And you, you could, you would do a great job and everyone would love it. And then, oh, this movie just came out. Yeah. Basically the same premise. So, sorry.Michael Jamin (00:30:20):Yeah.Jonathan Aibel (00:30:21):And that's when we had been meeting this, this fantastic exec name Christine Belsen, who was then at Henson.Michael Jamin (00:30:30):Mm-Hmm.Jonathan Aibel (00:30:30):. And we were huge Muppet fans. Right. And she brought us in and we totally hit it off. And she said, I wanna do a Muppet kung fu movie.Michael Jamin (00:30:39):UhhuhJonathan Aibel (00:30:40):. And we thought, oh my God, yeah, that would be so great. Yes. Sign us up for that. And we said, but you know, we read that that Dreamers is doing this Jack Black, kung fu kung fu Panda movie. And she said, oh, those movies take forever. I don't think it's, I I wouldn't worry about that. So then we don't hear from her for a while. We're worried what's going on. Then we get a call from her. Okay. So I moved over to Dreamworks and we're looking for writers who come from Panda.Michael Jamin (00:31:08):Wow.Jonathan Aibel (00:31:08):And we said, oh, okay. So it was just a case where it started off simple enough, they asked us to come in for just two weeks of consulting to see what they had underway and talk about the story. Cuz it was in a roughMichael Jamin (00:31:25):But had be different. Dreamworks has a whole different system over there. So what do you mean consultant? Cause I know they worked very differently from other studios.Jonathan Aibel (00:31:33):Well, so there had been writers who, well kind of what happens is, you know, king, king of the hill, the Simpsons though, shows very writer driven. Right. It doesn't have time. You don't have time to be anything other than ri writer driven. So the animators are given the script and the audio. Right. And they're So draw this,Michael Jamin (00:31:54):Hey, it's Michael Jamin. If you like my videos and you want me to email them to you for free, join my watch list. Every Friday I send out my top three videos. These are for writers, actors, creative types. You can unsubscribe whenever you want. I'm not gonna spam you and it's absolutely free. Just go to michaeljamin.com/watchlist.Jonathan Aibel (00:32:18):And in feature animation, Dreamworks especially, they may take that script and they'll take tens, the first 10 scenes of act, the first half the movie and give it to 10 different storyboard artists who will take that and read it and say, I see what this scene is doing, but maybe I can do it this way. And they will draw something and write it and animate and, and storyboard it and often record the dialogue themselves. And it's sort of like almost like what is it? 32 short films about Glen Gould where you end up with these almost mini movies in the beginning of a movie anyway. Like at the start of a development process where you would watch this movie and say, okay, that PO is different from this PO who's different from that po. And you watch it and you think, this doesn't make any sense, but I can start to see a story in there.(00:33:13):And then they'll do it iteratively. So then you're on that scene there, that moment I really understood who the character was. So more of that moment. So by way of saying, you may have someone who came in and wrote a script, but they might be long gone at this point cuz now it's been torn up it's storyboard and now you're walk working off transcripts where they've written down what's on screen. And that's what you're rewriting off of. So by the team time we came in, there was like a movie ish. Like you could, there was something in black and white you could watch mm-hmm. that everyone knew wasn't necessarily coherent. But the point isn't coherence. The point is what, what jumps out at you? Like we watched and said, oh, I think what you're doing is, it's kind of like a Cinderella story, right?(00:34:06):He's the guy in the beginning who wants to go to the kung fu ball mm-hmm. and can't go. And then the Prince points at him, and then he goes on this thing, and now the bad guy's coming for him and he doesn't know. And is he the chosen one? Or isn't he the chosen one? It's like those are like, now it's, it feels a little glib for me to say that as if it were obvious. It, it was, it's it was not it obvious. It's, it's, you're sitting there thinking, is it this story? No. Maybe it's the story. Some of it is, there are, there are two, Jack, Jack has, Jack Black has two kind of two great. Our type of our typical characters. One is the high fidelity like the jerk Yeah. Who deep down is suffering from low self-esteem. Right. And then he has the friendly guy who deep down is suffering from low self-esteem.(00:35:00):Right. So some of the, the production of the, the development of Kung Fu Panda was, which, which Jack is in our movie. Is he the guy who's chosen to be this kung fu guy and then realizes, oh my God, this is great. Now I don't have to work anymore. Now I can just go to the palace and hang out and relax and, and live it up until he finds out there's a responsibility. So there was some of that version of the movie. Then there's the guy who's wishes more than anything. He can be the kung fu master, but knows because of he's a big panda. That's impossible. Cuz Panas don't do kung fu and then his dream comes true. And then he has to, you know, that's what the movie ended up being. But when you started seeing that character in the opening reel, you'd say, whoa, I, I wanna, I, I wanna know more Right about that. And that's the magic of these time. You hadMichael Jamin (00:35:51):To sense of it. But see that's what I'm, I'm curious though, cuz for me it seems counterintuitive. It feel, it feels like you're putting the cart ahead of the horse. It's like, you know, I wonder if, was that, did you feel the same way? Because usually, you know, okay, we have an idea. We come, we have Ari, the writers come up with a th a thread, you know, through line and there's a story and Well,Jonathan Aibel (00:36:09):It's, it's inefficient for sure. But I think you can look at animated movies for the most part as a genre and say for the most part they're really well constructed.Michael Jamin (00:36:22):Right.Jonathan Aibel (00:36:23):And I think this is, this is why, because if a writer's gonna, it's very hard to create a great movie off of six drafts, even eight drafts, 10 drafts. Mm-Hmm. and, and just see it on paper and say, yeah, that's gonna work. Because no one knows how to read a script.Michael Jamin (00:36:43):I see.Jonathan Aibel (00:36:44):Like, even as a professional writer, I don't think I could read a script and say, this is gonna be an amazing movie. You can say this is a great script. Right. But is it gonna be an amazing movie? I don't know, an animation, you're making the movie as you're writing the movie, so it's not you, it makes sense. Theoretical. Is this gonna be good? It's ah, I, I see that moment. I see Poe and his father. Right. Having that moment where Poe is afraid to tell his dad what he wants to do with his life. I see. That's one thing. Makes sense. How do we build on that?Michael Jamin (00:37:17):Right. That makes sense to So it's very collaborative with you and the animators then.Jonathan Aibel (00:37:21):Oh yeah. The storyboard team, the directors, the producer, the actors, Uhhuh . It was it very different from TV animation. Right.Michael Jamin (00:37:32):SoundsJonathan Aibel (00:37:32):Very different. And I, our, our, one of our first the first moment we realized that was the producer said, I I want you to sit in a room with this guy, a storyboard artist and talk about the scene and what it could be. So we sat with him and we worked line by line. We hopped it and said, it could be this could be this. Yeah. I could draw this, do this. Said great, we're gonna write it up. We wrote it up, gave it into him. Three weeks later we go to watch the scene. It's nothing at all we discussed and went to the producer, but a, a thing. She said, yeah, I know, but I know he's kind of out there. And I wanted to see what he would take your stuff and give you, you know, if you, if all you want, if all you're expecting is the best version of what you've already done, you're closing off the chance that you'll be surprised by something.Michael Jamin (00:38:24):Right.Jonathan Aibel (00:38:25):So that's cool. On the other hand, sometimes in their scenes where you just say, can you just please do the, the pages? Right. Like, we've thought a lot about this. We understand. And there's some scenes in that first movie, which went pretty much from our pages to the final version. Cuz they were just compact. They made sense. Right. There wasn't a lot of room, but there wasn't a need for a lot of exploration. It was okay, that works. So let's just get that right going and move on to the theMichael Jamin (00:38:52):Others. So they brought you in under contract for a couple of weeks just to see how you would respond to the animators?Jonathan Aibel (00:38:59):Yeah, we had a after, well, no, to see what we would, it wasn't a trial. It was, they thought in 10 days we would give them an outline that they could work off of.Michael Jamin (00:39:12):But even still, you, they, they knew that they would probably go off via the reservation and you'd be required to Yeah. But that'sJonathan Aibel (00:39:19):Collaborate more. That's, but I think that happened a lot. It wasn't, it was more of then when we pitched our take on it to Jeffrey Katzenberg and he said, great, when you, when can you guys start writing Uhhuh. ? Okay. And then the other people lo looked at each other like, oh, I guess we, I guess we should probably get that, put that deal in place. So then we wrote a draftMichael Jamin (00:39:38):Mm-Hmm. .Jonathan Aibel (00:39:40):And then they took the draft and then started going through that process of tearing it apart. And at, at which point they realized it would probably be helpful to have us around. And I think it, what helped is that coming from tv, we, we knew storyboards, we knew how to read storyboards. We knew what happens in an editing room and how actors perform. Right. So we came to it with production skills or an, an understanding of the process that that helped us come in and say, oh, I think you could, you can cut a few frames there and actually know what we were talking about. At, at the same time, the, the big difference was television is it's a, it's a sprint as you know. Yeah. It's, you need to get this done because the actors are gonna be here at 10:00 AM to read this and record this.(00:40:35):So you need something for them. So we were approached feature animation, we gotta get this done, we gotta get this done. And then what you realize is that you, that's the exact wrong way to do because you, you get it all done now then when stuff starts changing, you've already written stuff that's, it's obsolete before anyone has seen it. Right. It's like animation is best. I think it's like, it's a marathon of sprints where we need, this scene has to go into production and Jack is coming in Thursday to record this. We need these three pages done. All right, we'll get it done, we'll get it done. Great. Now in six weeks, we're gonna need sequence 1500 going into rough layout though. That's the next one. I know it's,Michael Jamin (00:41:21):But you're working off an an outline. You know what the story is, right?Jonathan Aibel (00:41:24):You do and you don't. Isn't that, I know that's a weird thing to say, but you, Lenny, I can't tell you the number of boards there that would say big battle, like act three, big battle you know, wrap up epilogue.Michael Jamin (00:41:39):Is this the way animation movies were done like at Disney back in the day? Is this where they're getting this from?Jonathan Aibel (00:41:45):It's possible. I I think what where it comes from is that what's your expense, your greatest expense of time. And therefore money is the animator, the person at Disney drawing the cell mm-hmm. at Dreamworks. That final, the final editor moving frame by frame. That takes a lot of time. And it is such a skill and the people who do it are so brilliant that it's not like you can say we need six more animators who can capture Poe. It's, there's this guy Dan, Dan Wagner, just a brilliant animator and he was the one who could give Poe his soul.(00:42:29):Right. So you only get so much Dan. So you don't want to give Dan 10 scenes to do and say, we're not sure if these are all gonna work. But, so you are not giving the animators the scenes until they're ready at the same time. The animators can only do so much at the same time. So so while they're working on one scene, there's no reason to have the other scenes done. So it's sort of like you back, you back up into the process and you'd say, well if they can only animate these this much now mm-hmm. , well let's keep working on those other scenes and make them better and keep playing with them until it's too late. And then we'll, we'll turn 'em around. Right. So you really, you have the time to get it right. And if you said no, let's rush that. We, we gotta get All right. Now there's no reason to.Michael Jamin (00:43:16):It sounds like this cuz knowing how you guys ran King of the Hill, it sounds like this is like the perfect fit for you because you guys would often rewrite the hell out of a scene trying different ways and just experimenting.Jonathan Aibel (00:43:26):That was, I I think Thank you. I think it was, it, it it is a good fit for us to, to have said, okay, we've written that scene. There, there are a lot of exercises that are, are kind of cool that you can use, which is stuff like, well let's write the opposite. Right? You have someone come into a scene who's really excited, like, well, what if they came into the scene feeling the other way and that you flipped. You kind of have that, the opportunity to exploreMichael Jamin (00:43:58):More. Right.Jonathan Aibel (00:43:59):And then, and know that there's no punishment for it because the whole point is to experiment.Michael Jamin (00:44:05):Right. That's the point. So did they keep you under, how does it work? Do they keep you under contract at that point, Dreamworks, to do other movies? Or are you constantly pitching them to get assigned other projects orJonathan Aibel (00:44:17):That No, we had, we had a, it was great in that it started off, I think it was, we were there four days a weekMichael Jamin (00:44:25):Mm-Hmm. Jonathan Aibel (00:44:26):And I think at the time we were in person then it would be three, then after six months, three days a week, as there's less to change, they need less abuse. So then it was two days a week, then one day a week. And then at the same time we were doing other rewrites in other studios. And I think it was when we got down to one day a week, they said, you know, we have this smoothie monsters versus aliens when you wanna work on that. Right.Michael Jamin (00:44:49):So you were never squeeze.Jonathan Aibel (00:44:51):We were one day monsters. Four days.Michael Jamin (00:44:53):All right. So you were alwaysJonathan Aibel (00:44:54):Kind. Yeah, always. Show by show.Michael Jamin (00:44:56):I see. You're always jumping. Right. So it wasJonathan Aibel (00:44:58):Never, and then, and it, it was nice cuz you know, you don't wanna, we liked it because it led us take the projects that spoke to us that Right. Looked like they were gonna be fun. While also, like, the great thing about Panda was it was a hit came out. It was a hit. And when you've written a movie, it's a hit. People want you to write their movies. Right. So it, and and also people want you to write movies similar to the movie that was just a hit.Michael Jamin (00:45:28):Right.Jonathan Aibel (00:45:29):So it didn't matter that we had done King The Hill or other stuff. It was, oh, they, they wrote Fu Pan, they should write the Chipmunks movies. We'll offer that to them.Michael Jamin (00:45:38):Right. Right.Jonathan Aibel (00:45:39):So talking Animal, oh, here's another talking animal.Michael Jamin (00:45:42):So did you have toJonathan Aibel (00:45:43):Ever Thenn Bozer,Michael Jamin (00:45:46):Did you have to pitch, when you go on further assignments, are they pretty much yours because of, or do you have to pitch? Do you have to win that assignment?Jonathan Aibel (00:45:54):It's always a little of both. I mean, look, we were very, we were very lucky in that they weren't bake offs where Yeah. Six people are coming in to pitch this. It was, I think that the Chipmunks people really like Kung Fu Panda. It was just a rewrite. Can you come? It was over Christmas.Michael Jamin (00:46:16):UhhuhJonathan Aibel (00:46:17):. So I think that that definitely helped that they found us saying, yeah, we'll give up your, our holiday to, to write these pages for you.Michael Jamin (00:46:24):Right.Jonathan Aibel (00:46:25):But then the, the luck was these were, these became franchises. So then they come you for Comfort Panda Two and Comfort Panda Three and Chipmunks three. Right. And, and then we through people knew what Dreamwork got to SpongeBob. So then you'd do SpongeBob to second SpongeBob movie that led to the third SpongeBob movie.Michael Jamin (00:46:44):I didn't even mention those. Cause that's not even on your I M D B. We'll have to update that when we get off the, the Zoom. Yeah. What update your page? I didn't know any of this. I didn't know you did the I didn't know you did that. And so, okay. Because that's a big deal. Cause I, I remember, you know, when Si and I, we did, we did a couple of movies. We sold a couples, they didn't get made. We sold a couple movies and then we were all we're brought into you know, we didn't realize they were bake offs. We didn't, so we, we pitched for, you know, a couple big companies, I don't have to mention what they are. And, and we're told Yeah, you got the, you got it. You got it. And then only to discover that someone else got it. We didn't even know o other people were trying to get, like, we had no idea. And that's a lot. You're talking about months and months of heartbreaking wasted work and then the project never even made. So, but you don't really have it's true to deal with that True. Because of your level, you know. Yes,Jonathan Aibel (00:47:34):Yes and no. The the no is if they're, if you've worked with them on Kung fu Panda one, two, and three, there's a good chance they'll come to you for Kung fu Panda four.Michael Jamin (00:47:46):Right.Jonathan Aibel (00:47:47):So, and if you hit it off, feel like they may say, come in with some ideas and they like an idea. So they're not just saying, here's the deal before you've pitched anything. So there were meetings, but you know, they know you can deliver. That's kind of the main thing. Right. If it's people who you don't really know, then yeah. It's, they're rebooting this franchise and their hearing takes. And what we've learned, actually the hard way is if you're going to put yourself in that situation, you want to put as, I don't wanna say as little work as possible. You want to, you wanna do the right amount of work. That's the the best way where, but it's, we've, we've gone in and we've pitched I know, but we've gone in where we've pitched, you pitched for 20 minutes and then you realize by the second sentence you said the words they don't want to hear like, oh, that's not the kind of movie they want to do at all.(00:48:47):Right. And we've learned a better strategies to go and say, here, I I understand you wanna do a silly putty movie. I'm, I'm totally making this up, but here's, you could go this way where Silly Putty, it's a revenge story where it's a John Wick me silly putty. Right. Or it's the origin story of how a serious putty became silly putty because of a, of a family tragedy. And he's the clown who lasts through to you . Like, you know, each of these is an archetype movie. Right. And then it's, I don't know if any of those strike, well we kind of do like that. It's like, okay, okay, well we'll come back to you with that. It'sMichael Jamin (00:49:23):Interesting cuz you set the terms then over the pitch chart. Cuz that's not usually how we go in. We, here's the, here's the take, here's our take. And then, you know, you could be your, you could be completely off. I didn't know you had a choice.Jonathan Aibel (00:49:33):Well, this is a new, this is a new, this is a new realization. Uhhuh having, because you know, kind of what's happened is after doing a lot of these movies, you start to think, okay, I like this. I I know what I'm doing. What's something I don't really know how to do that I haven't done before mm-hmm. . And that's the type of movie where a person isn't necessarily gonna say, Hmm, get me the guys who did Kung Panda. Right. So you gotta hustle for those little more. And those were the ones where I think we were over preparing for many of them by saying we're gonna blow 'em away with the le attention to detail. Yeah. And especially in a Zoom era where you blow 'em away with the tension detail, they're thinking is I just need three sentences to bring the boss. Really? And it's hard because as storytellers you sometimes feel like, I can't, I don't, I'm sorry, I cannot pitch this idea unless I understand the character arts and Yeah. Right. The three acts and you're think, you know, maybe sometimes you can go in and say, and then in the third act there's a huge battle in which the forces of evil have to go against the forces ofMichael Jamin (00:50:39):I see. I would be worried about pitching something that I didn't know how to actually break. You know what I'm saying? Like, youJonathan Aibel (00:50:43):Know. Yes, I know. I, I you eventually, you just kind of have to have confidence and say, you know what, we'll figure something out. We'll figure, it's hard. It's really hard to, even at this point we'll go into a rewrite and say, what is that third act set piece? I don't know, but we'll, we'll, we'll figure it out. And it's in the back of your head thing if I don't get that.Michael Jamin (00:51:06):Yeah. Right.Jonathan Aibel (00:51:08):And then one day it'll be like, oh, wait a minute. Well, what if this happened? Because we just like, it will, it will come to you. And I think it's, it's a little, maybe this is the animation experience. It's a little foolish to even think I know what the perfect act three is before I've actually written Acts one and two.Michael Jamin (00:51:28):Yeah. But you andJonathan Aibel (00:51:29):Instead rely on your instincts and your experienceMichael Jamin (00:51:32):Wanna build to something you wanna, I I it's so, I'm, I'm telling you how to do it. I have no idea how to do it.Jonathan Aibel (00:51:37):No, but, but, but of course you will build to it, you know, you need to build to something, but you may not know the ingredients yet. Like, you'll be writing something and say, well, I'll give you a good example. In, in Conco Panda, we wound up having this, this pose, big realization. Mm-Hmm. that, can I give spoilers after 15 years after movies opened?Michael Jamin (00:51:59):I believe. I believe so. Okay.Jonathan Aibel (00:52:01):So Pose opened the scroll in it's blank, and he realizes he's failed. And his father says to him, it's okay, you can be a noodle old man just like me. And by the way, it's time. I told you the secret ingredient in my suit. And the secret ingredient is nothing. There is no secret ingredient. It was just to make something special, you just have to believe it's special. And really, that was just a joke about his father, who in the first scene we wrote that, oh, that'd be funny if he has a secret ingredient soup. And later we find out there is no secret ingredient. It's just a marketing gimmick. And it wasn't until he got to the later scene where someone, I think this bill Damascus, his name, he is, he was then the executive of dreamworks. And he said, I, I, I like what you're doing there.(00:52:49):You're kind of making comparison between the scroll being blank and the soup, not really having the spec, the specialness, it's that's it into here. And we said, that's not at all what we're, is that what we're doing? That is what we're doing. You know, like, I don't know if we consciously did that or everyone working on the movie was putting that stuff in there. But once, so if we had started with, what is it? We never would've gotten there. But like, it's funny you were talking about ingredients, but we had these ingredients of the father, the soup. We had this scroll that was blank, and it took a whole bunch of time. And thinking for a, a person to look at that with fresh eyes and say, I think you've given yourself the moment you need to do the rest of the movie.Michael Jamin (00:53:37):Do you think this is how they tell their movies at at Pixar? They have a different process. Do you thinkJonathan Aibel (00:53:43):That I I don't, I don't know all I've, all I know of the process there is, they seem to draw on tablecloths.Michael Jamin (00:53:51):Is that Oh, really?Jonathan Aibel (00:53:51):That I don't know. That was at, there's some documentary where they have this, this famous tablecloth that's amazing. Where it was, they weren't, the Brain Trust was meeting. And I said, well, here's some movies I think we could do. There's what if tos come to life? What, what if bugs come to life? What if Bumper Beyond that, I don't really know their process. It's probably somewhat similar.Michael Jamin (00:54:13):So. Interesting. And when you work, you know, you're, and I'm jumping around, but your partner, Glen, he doesn't, he lives not in la So how do you guys do, what do you work in on Zoom? Is that how you guysJonathan Aibel (00:54:24):Yeah, we, oh, we've been Skyped for, for years and years. Just, just audio. Just, I'm a, I'm Aist and I'll tell you why. JustMichael Jamin (00:54:32):Yeah, go on. And why just audio?Jonathan Aibel (00:54:34):I'm a Skype because Skype lets you Skype out. So you can call people's cell phones. So if our agent or lawyer or an executive or I know we need them to take a meeting, he's just stays in my ear and All right, let me patch him in and then you can Okay. Call. also we started before Zoom,Michael Jamin (00:54:49):Right?Jonathan Aibel (00:54:50):So we're And why no video?Michael Jamin (00:54:52):Yeah.Jonathan Aibel (00:54:54):Is, initially it was for bandwidth reasons. It was laggy at Skype at one point, and Glen was out in the sticks and didn't haveMichael Jamin (00:55:03):Because you could have used a cell, a phone. You know that Skype without video. It was a phone.Jonathan Aibel (00:55:08):Yeah. Yeah. There are a lot of other things we could do, but we realized I don't need to see him staring at me. I, I don't, I, and I, I'm not like the old married couple. We're okay with the silence.Michael Jamin (00:55:21):And do you,Jonathan Aibel (00:55:22):When you're going like this and you're not hearing anything,Michael Jamin (00:55:24):Are you on final draft collaborator? Is that what you're doing? Or what? No. Well, how'sJonathan Aibel (00:55:29):That? I know there's a lot of, there's a lot of that You could, we could do. And if it's real, really important, we might say, oh, let's, like now we outline on, on Google Docs.Michael Jamin (00:55:41):Okay.Jonathan Aibel (00:55:41):Instead of sending Word documents back and forth, is this, are you working on Tuesday's version? No, this is Thursday's. Wait. Now you, now you can see it. And that's useful. But I, I feel like daring, there are two ways to write. One is staring at the words and the other is staring at the sky. Right. And one day, some days I feel like doing one Glen feels like one sometimes the other like, I don't want to even know what's there. I just want to, but who's coming up with stuff? In, well, hopefully Glen, there have been times where we'll come up with a whole thing and then say, you got that. I thought you were typingMichael Jamin (00:56:20):.Jonathan Aibel (00:56:21):So we, we usually sa

Hosts Jason Chambers MMA Fighter and commentator and BJJ blackbelt and Bill Duff pro NFL football player talk about being On "Human Weapon," a show on the History Channel where two adventurers seek out the masters of martial arts from karate and Capoeira to Muay Thai and Kung fu. Jason sits down and Skyped with good friend and former "Human Weapon" co-host Bill Duff as we discuss our uncensored thoughts on the show and go into some behind the scenes issues we encountered. Available on Spotify, YouTube and wherever your favorite Podcast are! #podcast #humanweapon #martialarts #mma #spotify #joeroganexperience #historychannel HISTORY® is the leading destination for award-winning original series and specials that connect viewers with history in an informative, immersive, and entertaining manner across all platforms. The network's all-original programming slate features a roster of hit series, premium documentaries, and scripted event programming.

Original Date: March 30, 2015Dean Haglund is back from Australia where he was busy laying the groundwork for his full-time move down under in May. While he was there, he Skyped with Phil Leirness because, well, your friends in podcasting miss each other when they are apart AND because there was the big news about the return of “The X-Files” to discuss. Part of this week's show will be that (recorded) conversation, wherein they also discuss Gillian Anderson's “other” current series, the absolutely terrific “The Fall”.Back in L.A. there's plenty of TV news to discuss, including Emmy Awards rulings, a new host for “The Daily Show”, the return of “Coach”, the possible return of “Twin Peaks” and the “Sherlock” Christmas special. Before his trip, Dean performed and gave a fantastic presentation about Chaplin and City Lights at the Los Angeles Breakfast Club. This will get discussed as the “Live Event of the Week” before Dean and Phil launch into movie news featuring the latest on Eddie Murphy, Idris Elba, Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Bradley Cooper. All that, plus two puzzling emails from listeners.This week on YOUR Chillpak Hollywood Hour! Wherever good podcasts can be found!

It is a pleasure to welcome singer and songwriter Aneesa Sheikh as the first guest of The Jake’s Take with Jacob Elyachar Podcast for 2021!Born in Kentucky and currently residing in Michigan, Aneesa Sheikh is a Pakistani-American who grew up in a close-knit family. Aneesa is the current holder of Miss Michigan Teen USA's title and is a successful model that has appeared on countless national ad campaigns. Aneesa started her non-profit organization: Music4M.I.R.A.C.L.E. M.I.R.A.C.L.E. is the acronym for Music, Inspires, Reaches, Accepts, Captures, Loves, and Equally.Her goal through Music4M.I.R.A.C.L.E. is to spread music therapy and give hope to those who are experiencing a medical crisis. Aneesa has performed at multiple charities such as St. Jude’s and the Healing Notes Foundation.For the first 2021 edition of The Jake’s Take with Jacob Elyachar Podcast, Aneesa Sheikh spoke about several of her songs: “Bad Thing,” “New Normal,” “Tough Times,” and her first-holiday single: “Happy Little Holiday.” Aneesa also spoke about how she Skyped and Zoomed into hospitals during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Early Work is back for a new series, and the work is even EARLIER than before. We kick off with our first American guest, the inimitable comedian and poet Catherine Cohen, who kindly Skyped into the podcast from a porn set at 9am. One of the most equipped Early Work guests of all time as she brings a hench 60 page word document full of angsty teenage poetry, which is not so much 'up Rhys's street' as 'living in Rhys's loft'. There’s also a song written in the bath she was convinced would be chart-topping, a perfect voice for British advertising and the results of what happens if you put your entire body of early work through an algorithm that writes your next poem for you. Plus, Rhys shares a plagiarised poetry idea and one of the most excruciating heartbreak stories he can muster. We're back. Follow Early Work on Twitter @EarlyWorkPod or you can follow him @rhysjamesy Email your Early Work to earlyworkpodcast@gmail.com

01/24/2014 Episode 3 I sat down and Skyped with my 'ol pal Jared Malone. We've known each other for almost 20 years now!! Lots of stories, some I didn't remember, and all on his lunch break. --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/yamatat/support

The Arizona Cardinals unexpectedly fell to 2-1 Sunday after their upset home loss to the Lions. Kyler Murray looked well, human – throwing three interceptions and the Big Red defense is really banged up heading into Week Four. azcentral columnist Kent Somers (9:45 on podcast) talked about Kyler's struggles, Larry Fitzgerald getting lost in the offense, a look around the NFC Wesr and much more. SunDevilSource.com Publisher Chris Karpman (20:00 on podcast) Skyped in to discuss the return of Pac-12 football, the latest news around ASU and much more. Plus, Brad and Eric recap a crazy weekend of college which saw LSU and Oklahoma both get upset at home.

Just as it appeared the Pac-12 was prepared to join the rest of the Power 5 conferences this fall, the outlook is more gloomy with COVID outbreaks in Boulder and Eugene. Brad and Eric discuss how this could be what drops the curtain on Commissioner Larry Scott's run with the conference. South Point Casino Resort Sports Marketing Director Jimmy Vaccarro (14:54 on podcast) previewed Thursday Night Football, Lions-Cardinals Sunday in Glendale and the college football weekend which begins to ramp up on Saturday with the SEC starting. Plus, azcentral/Gannett Chief Film & Media Critic Bill Goodykoonz (34:55 on podcast) Skyped in to talk about the upcoming election and much more.

These are the words of Joseph Uscinski, Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Miami.I spoke to Joe for Webworm, and our conversation made me wonder if things aren’t quite as fucked up as they seem. So I guess today’s newsletter is… hopeful, somehow?Joe Uscinski wrote American Conspiracy Theories (an excellent book) and as you probably gathered from the title, he’s very passionate about conspiracy theories. He’s a member of the University of Miami U-LINK team, which combats online extremist conspiracy theories, and also does a fuckload of survey work for the likes of the Pew Research Centre.In short, he really has his finger on the pulse about what Americans believe.And as debate raged about the possible identity of Q this week, I wanted to talk to Joe about how widespread the believe in QAnon actually is, and how worried we should be. I wanted to know the scale of the problem.I really like Joe. He’s well educated and opinionated — and he’s also a great speaker. Right now, he’s in hot demand. I accidentally Skyped him on the wrong day, and he sounded upbeat but also kinda exhausted. He’d just done six American press interviews in a row, most of them about QAnon.When I reconnected, I really loved our conversation. I think my kiwi accent threw him a little, and there were a lot of laughs as we talked. The podcast version of this newsletter is really fun. He swears quite a bit.In short — we kinda disagree on some things — but I knew we would.He thinks the problem of people disappearing down conspiratorial rabbit holes is no worse than it’s ever been. That it’s exactly the same. Joe told me social media isn’t to blame. I struggle with this, but he’s smart and I wanted to hear him out.We also agreed on a lot of things, including the bit where he yelled at me:“This is a plea to the conspiracy theorists - make up something fucking new, so that I can actually give a shit at this point! Because it is so boring, oh my God!”I found this conversation fascinating, and at times confronting. I hope you enjoy it. Like all the content here on Webworm, this edition is possible thanks to subscribers. They fund the work here, and also get access to bonus newsletters and podcasts. If it doesn’t cause you financial hardship, you can sign up here to stay across future episodes:You can consume our conversation in two ways: a podcast you can listen to (above), or a written version you can read (below).Take your pick.David.Joe - you are a polls expert. Take it away!Just to give you a rundown of the polls in this country, I will tell you the brief history of why I started polling QAnon, because it wasn’t even something I was paying attention to in mid-2018. It got brought to my attention, largely from a little bit of online harassment that I got from these Q people! They went through all my pictures on Twitter and decided to make a collage suggesting I was a satanic sex trafficker. It was the dumbest pictures they picked — and of course they found one of me wearing red socks, and the red socks mean you are a sex trafficker, or eat babies, or something like that. At that point I thought, “OK, let’s see what’s happening here.”And what happened very quickly in late July of 2018 was that some people wore QAnon tee shirts to a Trump rally in Tampa, Florida — my home state.And because of that, QAnon got a tonne of media coverage, in all the major newspapers. So I decided I was going to run a poll in Florida. And I thought “why don’t I throw QAnon on here, and just see what happens?”And a lot of people didn’t know what it was, and it was not rated very highly. So we said “how would you rate the QAnon movement on a scale from zero to 100, where 100 is “you really like it” and zero is “you really hate it.”It came out with about an average of 22. And to put that in perspective, it was about a point higher than where Floridians rated Fidel Castro! And if you know anything about Florida, it’s that we don’t like Castro here! So it was not liked. But what was even more telling was that the average rating from Democrats and from Republicans were not different. So they both disliked it about equally. And what predicted belief in QAnon was not being Republican or Conservative, but just having a conspiratorial world view. So this idea that QAnon is a far right conspiracy theory does just not hold water at all. There is nothing conservative about it, except for positing Trump as a hero — but he is not a hero because he is Republican, but because he is an outsider.I have repeated this poll in Florida just in June, and several other polls nationwide, and have found no growth [in QAnon belief] whatsoever. So most people don’t know what this is, the vast majority of people don’t like it, and it’s not gaining in popularity.However the headlines in all the newspapers are the exact opposite. They say “it is huge and getting bigger, it’s gone mainstream, it’s taking over American life, it’s far right…” Of course, they never tell you what that means. I mean I am reading a piece in the New York Times right now, and the headline says “The republican embrace of QAnon goes far beyond Trump”, that’s the kind of headline we see everywhere.But it really doesn’t. I mean maybe it goes a little bit beyond Trump, but it doesn’t go far beyond Trump. So what is happening here? Are we seeing a huge disconnect between the reporting and the perception of what your polling numbers are actually saying?Well the data is out there, I published my initial poll in the Washington Post, I followed up with my polls in the Washington Post, the Emerson poll is out there for anyone to see, the Pew poll is out there — and that made headlines! So there is no excuse at this point for journalists to get this wrong. So they are doing it purposefully.And I think some of them are starting to see, and to change their language, just enough to get away with the crap: “Oh, well, there are millions of QAnon accounts - and that’s growing…” Right? And if you are not reading carefully… accounts aren’t people. Accounts are accounts, who knows if they are sincere, or real people, or if one person has 1000 accounts.So some of this is, frankly, dishonest at this point. I would have forgiven them before, but they should know better. And I don’t want to speculate on people’s motives — it may be that they are chasing clicks, by inciting this moral panic. It could be that the mainstream news legacy outlets have it in for social media, and are more than happy to attack them saying they are turning everyone into a nutcase, when in fact they are not. It could be that there is some political bias here, maybe it is easy for them to say “Republicans are a bunch of QAnon nutcases” and then ignore stuff like ANTIFA and stuff like that.I think there is this thing at the moment where people are coming across the idea of a conspiracy theory for the first time, and they are panicking about it. I feel that in America, it’s been a part of its culture to have this way of thinking about things! That what you are told is not necessarily the truth. I mean, right back to the foundations of the country, it’s always been there. It just feels like perhaps there is this knee-jerk reaction to what we are seeing now.I mean it’s true it’s always been there, but it’s also a media myth that the US is exceptional in this way. I would say Americans are exceptional in many ways, but conspiracy theories is just not one of them!Polling, when you do it across countries… we are middling, at best. If you read the news headlines, whenever a major newspaper will talk about conspiracy theories in whatever country, it’s always the people of that country who are the most conspiratorial!All these claims are based on nothing, it’s all baloney. And also when you read about “when is the time of conspiracy theories?” - journalists say it’s always “now, now. Now is the time.” And you can find headlines almost every year saying “this is the golden age, this is the time!” But it can’t always be true.I am just observing from New Zealand, but say we focus on COVID, there seems to be a lot of disinformation and misinformation that is fuelled by social media sending you along on an algorithm. Look at something like Plandemic, that documentary that was shared around so widely: how do you feel about the positioning of something like that as being “oh holy shit everyone is doing down the rabbit hole” — do you think that has been blown out of proportion?Yes. Absolutely. This is the funny thing, having been polling on COVID conspiracy theories. I ran a poll in March, and another in June, and Plandemic placed in the middle of that, and was shared supposedly millions of times.Yet — no difference in the conspiracy beliefs. No difference.And so it’s like we known a lot about how media affects people. We have been studying this for a very long time. For hundreds of years. And we have strong theories to explain this, and we have decided to throw this all out and just decide that everyone is a lemming, when it comes to internet conspiracy theories.It is not the case that conspiracy theorising has gone up at all. It is not clear that conspiracy theorising has gone up due to social media. We may find in effect we may have people who already have strong conspiratorial world-views and they are going to search out what they want to find anyway.And they are writing about it on their Facebooks walls…Yeah. So the view is already there, right? Even when we look at polls of specific conspiracy theories over time, it is not the case that pre and post internet more people are believing conspiracy theories. There may be less. Essentially what you are saying is that during a pandemic, people that are already predisposed —Well not even during a pandemic! Just put the pandemic aside for now, just in the age of the internet people will find what they are looking for. And when this pandemic first started, I was thinking to myself “if I were to take people into a lab and to turn them into conspiracy theorists, and jack every input up to 11… the pandemic would be it!” The economic uncertainty, the fear that comes from disease, an election, all sorts of stuff going on, social media, political elites engaging in conspiracy theories — everything is jacked up to 11. And I haven’t really seen any major increase! I mean, there could be one and I just haven’t found it yet, but I am just not finding this!What it tells me is just more evidence of what I have been seeing for a long time, is that this is largely a stable phenomenon.COVID conspiracy theories are new, but only because COVID is new.And if you remove “Bill Gates” from the conspiracy theories about him, you go back in time and just plug in “Soros”, “Rockefellers”, “Rothschilds”, “Freemasons”, whatever you want! So you know, this is a plea to the conspiracy theorists: make up something fucking new, so that I can actually give a shit at this point! Because it is so boring, oh my God.It’s like “Soros all over again, are we still having this conversation?!”Yeah — Soros, or some rich person trying to take over the world and they are going to put chips in our neck… I’ve fucking heard it, dude.So look, we have this celebrity chef over in this part of the world — Chef Pete Evans — and he went and started with lots of posts about food, and over the last three months his Instagram is now your classic conspiratorial mess, with a lot of memes and crazy photoshopped images. If everyone has this baseline in the world of being susceptible to conspiracy theories, it does feel to me amplified by people’s presence on social media, and people seem to be going down that rabbit hole a lot easier.It’s hard to know. And this is the thing: I think what we are doing a lot is confusing our ability to see and measure something, with the idea that that something is happening more often.  And confusing anecdotes with data.And so you’d go back 30 years and there would be no social media, so you could not track people’s conversations. So you could not see what people were saying next to the water-cooler. But now you can.There is this view like “how did people talk before Twitter?” and it’s like “they fucking talked!”Rumours were going around long before social media, believe it or not. Only a few months after the Kennedy assassination, 50% of Americans believed it was a conspiracy. By the mid 70s it was 80%. It’s only come down 35 points during the internet era. So it’s sort of strange to say “they can travel further and faster than ever before” when technically, yes, in that I can put things online and they can be accessed in Thailand right now — but it doesn’t mean that anyone is accessing it and caring about it, or adopting it as a belief.Do you think the fact somebody who has an idea that is a bit out there — say, “COVID isn’t real” — that before, they would say that to their friends around the water-cooler and be shot down straight away, whereas now there can jump on Facebook and have access to a lot of other people who will back them up?No, I think it’s the exact opposite!Okay, talk me through this. This is interesting. I read tonnes of articles all the time that are like “how do I talk to friends who believe in conspiracy theories” as if no-one knows how to do this. So the assumption of your question is that everyone was always shooting down people’s conspiracy theories, and no-one does that on social media. I mean it gets done on social media quite a bit. And it may be the case that social media is less hospitable to conspiracy theories than other forms of communication. Just to bring up the mainstream media, it kills me they blame social media for this. Because they are some of the biggest players.It also kills me that political elites start mounting a campaign against Facebook and Twitter, saying these spread conspiracy theories. It’s like “no, it’s the politicians who spread conspiracy theories!” They have the bigger bully puppet! I mean why does everyone think COVID’s exaggerated? “Gee, I dunno, maybe it’s because the president said it was?”Maybe because radio personalities with massive syndicated audiences said it was?Maybe because Fox news keeps saying it? I was reading stories from the Washington Post about QAnon, meanwhile the other side of their mouth they are publishing all this UFO nonsense!We all love a good Area 51 story! Look, there is no doubt a Facebook algorithm will push you down further down into a direction you are already looking in, like if I am watching a lot of Alex Jones, I will get pushed further into that zone. But you’re already there! No-one is going to Alex Jones unless they are already there.Well, say something softer — you are watching a Jordan Peterson video, a softer in, and then you are jumping in. I mean when you are talking about algorithms not pushing them in this direction, and not affecting them I struggle with that.I think you would have a hard time convincing a person who does not have an Alex Jones worldview to accidentally fall into his website, and they go “oh yeah, the frogs are all turning gay!” I am not saying it can’t happen — I imagine someone who is a blank slate who is willing to believe anything — but in that case, they will flip from Alex Jones to some other thing and believe that. I don’t know how many of those people exist. Do you sometimes feel like you are screaming into the void with your ideas?I am always screaming into the void!Look, you are very calm, but I know you are constantly talking to the press and come back to the same points.Well it’s the same thing over and over. And the media, the journalists always get upset with me because I fuck their stories right away. Because the only thing they have read is from the same media bubble they are in, right? So every interview I have done this week is on QAnon, and they will say “please explain to me why it is getting so huge” and I’m like “well no, it’s not” and they’re like “fuck!”So, in a way this is a very heartening conversation because you are saying we are seeing the exact same number of people in the population are going to dive into this stuff as they ever did. Where do you see the problem lying, then? I don’t think social media is turning people into conspiracy theorists. That view needs to stop. I don’t think that people are becoming more conspiratorial.However even if this is stable, it is still a problem and we have to be honest about it being stable, and we have to be honest about where it’s coming from.And it’s coming from people who have stable world-views, and that probably comes out of their socialisation, and it’s going to take a little more work. We can’t just give someone a link and it will change their worldview. It’s a tougher problem than we imagine.And if we are going to start throwing blame, then there is a lot of blame that should be going around. There are members of Congress who should be blamed for spreading conspiracy theories. Many members of Congress should be blamed for the advertising they put out which borders on that sort of stuff, and engages in misinformation. The speeches of our leaders involve misinformation, and sometimes conspiracy theories. If we are going to be even handed about it there is a lot of guilt to go around. Yes, Trump engages in a lot of conspiracy theories. That is bad. But so did Bernie Sanders. Saying the one percent controls everything, I am sorry but that is a conspiracy theory. And if you were to replace the words “one percent” with anything else, you would get it.So — it is easy to pick on a few sources for this, but once you open to your eyes you start seeing it everywhere. I mean the channel Animal Planet, it’s supposed to be about real animals. That’s what I thought. What is the biggest production they ever did? It was “we found a mermaid, and it washed up on the shore because the Navy is killing the mermaids…”And the History Channel has Ancient Aliens...Yes, also on Animal Channel, Finding Bigfoot. Guess what? They haven’t found him yet. You go the mainstream news and there is often playing with conspiracy theories, going beyond the evidence. Whether it’s the Washington Post and the UFO stories, or — and I will say this — I am glad there was Trump Russia investigation, but a lot of the coverage went way beyond what the available evidence was saying, and there were a lot of theories getting popped up that were way beyond that was appropriate at the time.And when the Mueller Report came out, it fell flat on its face.And so it’s everywhere.And a lot of the things that are problems now, like anti-vax theories — well, some of the big starts for the anti-vax movement is because one of the biggest journals in the world, The Lancet, decided to publish a terrible paper that was fraudulent, should never have been published, and it took them 10 years to take it down!Maybe Oprah Winfrey, who brought Jennifer McCarthy on her show and gave her a mainstream voice to this nonsense. And Bobby Kennedy Jr who continues to push it, and Robert De Niro, and Jim Carrey. So you know, this is out there.And you could take social media away tomorrow and it would not make one iota of difference.It’s a big call, and an important call, and I find it confrontational when you say it, and it’s fucking fascinating.Yeah, a lot of blame to go around. It’s a much more complex topic than we think, and we can’t just point at Mark Zuckerberg and say “your algorithms are turning us into zombies” - it’s a much more nuanced situation we are in.Please tell me that day that occurred in the past where we weren’t believing in conspiracy theories. Come on! When did that happen?Point taken.And this is the thing, I show people the data and then they have to pull this bullshit, and they do the exact same manoeuvring conspiracy theorists do: they want to hold onto their belief. So when I tell people “we have been running polls on QAnon and it’s not getting bigger” they go “maybe polls aren’t appropriate in this instance!” Fuck off!And we don’t have any evidence the internet is driving people to this, or people have beliefs they didn’t have in the past.“Oh, but it’s because it’s so easy to get now and it’s the groups!”It’s like “no, screw off!”Look, I don’t want to come across too dogmatic about it —Oh you are!Here’s the thing: new theories will be adopted over time and social media will have something to do with it, but it is largely convincing people who are already prone to being convinced of that particular theory.I think that people would be a little slower in adopting some of these beliefs from not being on social. In New Zealand we have the Public Party and its lead by Billy TK, and he is into all the stuff: 5G is evil, COVID isn’t real, the UN has a big worldwide plan to depopulate the planet.And he’s getting big town hall meetings that I would argue wouldn’t happen if there weren’t 20,000 people (which is big numbers for New Zealand by the way!) who had found each other on Facebook.But they would have done it another way. And third parties have always existed, and people have found each other far before the internet. So we have lots of evidence of political parties, and cults, and religions forming long before there was Facebook for them to find each otherYeah, Scientology kicked off pretty well pre-Twitter right?Yeah, everything kicked off! Christianity kicked off before it had a Facebook page! Billions of followers. So you don’t need any of this [social media] stuff for this to happen.And any insinuation they do: were you born yesterday? Do you have amnesia? Do you realise all these things we have in the world are long standing institutions that formed long before Facebook?Well look, I appreciate this conversation. And I think it’s a point of view that is not represented in the media at the same level as the opposing view.That’s true!  And I think you are going to be continuing to shout, and I respect you for that.Yeah and continue to shout and be ignored, yeah! If I am sitting over here in New Zealand and I am petrified of these theories flung around on my Facebook feed and how damaging that can be, what are you freaked out by? What should I be worried about?What should you be worried about? I mean here is what worries me in general right now: I prefer beliefs to be tied more to the truth. So I think we all have a job to do when it comes to fighting against these beliefs. And while I will disagree with a lot of people about the origin of these theories and how and why they spread, I will agree that they are a problem. And I am fully invested in solving that problem.And I think we will do a better job if we have an understanding of the origin of these beliefs instead of just blaming Facebook for it.But most certainly I am on board with anyone who will take reasonable measures in pushing back.So in that case, banning Facebook pages, putting restrictions on social, those may end up being counterproductive.I am not in favour of government censorship of this stuff, I don’t think it helps in any meaningful way, because largely these things are going to be constrained to those people already disposed to it anyway. And all you are doing is proving to them that the government is out to get them!So there is something for all of us to do. We need to find ways to change beliefs, to change world-views. Maybe that comes in the way of critical thinking courses earlier on in the educational process. Instead of shovelling facts down people’s throats out of textbooks, teach them how those facts come to be accepted as knowledge and how they did they get into the textbook? How do we generate knowledge? Those things need to be front-loaded into education earlier on. Thanks, Joe. It’s a lot. It’s a lot to think about!Phew. It’s a lot to digest, I know. I hope you enjoyed this newsletter — whether you read it, or listened to it. David. Get full access to Webworm with David Farrier at www.webworm.co/subscribe

San Diego Padres young star Fernando Tatis, Jr. set Twitter and baseball on fire Monday night after hitting a grand slam on a 3-0 pitch in a blowout win over the Rangers. Brad and Eric agree, MLB “purists” continue to drag the great game down as the baseball needs more young, outgoing stars like Tatis, Jr. The Diamondbacks continue to win – can the starting rotation become whole? Colorado pushed the Coyotes to the brink Monday with a blowout win which makes the series 3-1 Avs. SI.com NFL Senior Fantasy Analyst Michael Fabiano (12:53 on podcast) Skyped in to talk about the latest fantasy news with drafts heating up everywhere. Plus, a deep dive with the Voice of the Suns Al McCoy (26:38 on podcast). The Suns' future appears bright after their perfect 8-0 run in The Bubble.

As MLB COVID cases continue to add up, Brad wants to applaud the NHL and NBA for their proactive approach from the jump in terms of getting into a bubble for the protection and safety of players, coaches and staffers. Tuesday marks another tri-fecta day for sports in the Valley as the Coyotes, Suns and Diamondbacks are all in action. NBCSports.com NFL columnist Peter King (12:55 on podcast) Skyped in to discuss the new-look Arizona Cardinals, the loaded NFC West and much more with the regular season now in focus. Plus, SI Senior Fantasy Analyst Michael Fabiano (28:10 on podcast) on his new role and position at Sports Illustrated and the latest fantasy news from around the league.

On this episode of The Adaptables, Abbe chats about episode 10 of the Hulu and BBC adaptation of NORMAL PEOPLE by Sally Rooney. (Get well soon Emma!) She's joined by Maris Kreizman, book critic and host of The Maris Review. Abbe and Maris discuss grappling with the loss of loved ones, dating people with mental health issues in college, Skyping, sapiosexuality, and more. Discussion breakdown: Intro and Maris's Canadian galley of NORMAL PEOPLE (0:24–2:55) TRIGGER WARNING (depression and suicide) and episode recap (2:56–3:42) Connell hears about Rob's suicide (3:43–6:16) Asking for help: Connell seeks out a counsellor on Niall's insistence (6:17–6:43) Flashback to the funeral (6:44–8:00) Dissecting Marianne's motivations: why she comes back from Sweden for Rob's funeral but not Christmas (8:01–10:54) Marianne's eating disorder in the book vs. the show (10:55–12:28) Perfect Girlfriend No More: Helen confronts Connell and commendably chooses herself over playing second fiddle (12:29–15:22) Have you ever Skyped with anyone all night long while they slept? (15:23–17:37) A critical look at class, upward mobility, and the hidden costs of meritocracy in NORMAL PEOPLE (17:38–20:02) Intellectual intercourse: the glue that holds Marianne and Connell together (20:03–23:12) What Maris is currently reading and her top recommendations for the summer (23:13–25:56) Marianne Fringe Report: ✂ The chunky bright blue sweater that Marianne is sporting at the end of the episode gives us hope that this will be the last we see of Marianne's grayscale wardrobe. You will not be missed. The Adaptables is a podcast from Read it Forward and Penguin Random House that dives into your favorite book-to-screen adaptations. This season, we're watching the Hulu and BBC adaptation of NORMAL PEOPLE by Sally Rooney. Join hosts Abbe Wright and Emma Shafer as we interview authors, insiders and each other, about what makes an adaptable great, why watching and reading are important self-care rituals, and the many other books and shows we are binging and loving right now. Because at The Adaptables, we love to watch what we read. (Warning: there will be spoilers.) Send us an email or voice recording to AdaptablesPod@Gmail.com. What did you think of the episode? Are you watching the show? Is NORMAL PEOPLE a successful adaptation of the book? Follow @ReadItForward on Twitter and Instagram, follow Maris on Twitter and Instagram at @mariskreizman, tweet your thoughts on this episode and other adaptations you love. Leave us a review on Apple Podcasts! NEXT UP: We'll recap Episode 11 with Angela Ledgerwood.

The Miami Marlins had 13 players test positive for coronavirus. How will this impact the already shortened MLB season moving forward? The D-backs are off to a slow start as Robbie Ray continues to struggle to keep his pitch count down as evidenced in San Diego over the weekend. Brad caught up with AIA Executive Director David Hines (10:18 on podcast) who talked about a number of topics regarding the upcoming high school football season and the rest of the fall sports calendar as he and the AIA try to navigate through the pandemic. Plus, azcentral Chief Film and Media Critic Bill Goodykoontz (33:15 on podcast) Skyped in to talk about the passing of Regis Philbin, the political spin around COVID and much more.

We've Zoomed and Skyped and stayed home... and now we're being asked to reengage with the world... how rude. How do you work out what it is about connecting with others that hits the mark for you? Music by Mike Leite

Brad and Eric discuss some of the weekend headlines, including the return of golf and NASCAR capitalizing on many professional sports still at a standstill during the COVID19 pandemic. The Dallas Cowboys and Houston Texans are in the news as some players, including Cowboys' star running back Ezekiel Elliott has tested positive for the Coronavirus. NFL Network Host/Reporter Steve Wyche (00:53 on podcast) Skyped in to discuss the proactive approach he's been taking in hopes of making a difference to end racism in our country. He also talked about the league's stance, Colin Kaepernick's chances of returning to the league and much more. AIA Executive Director David Hines (24:01 on podcast) joined Brad to talk about a number of questions surrounding AZHS high school football, including the chances of the 2020 season being canceled, transfer rules for incoming out of state players and much more.

Jordan Hamm in for Brad on Wednesday to talk about the biggest headlines in sports – including how Major League Baseball just can't seem to figure this thing out. ESPN MLB Insider and good friend of the show Pedro Gomez (11:05 on podcast) Skyped in with Jordan to discuss the ongoing discussions between the players and the owners and how he sees this staring contest ending, if at all, this summer. He also discussed the in-state MLB talent pool with the draft scheduled to start Wednesday afternoon. NFL Network Host and Data Science Expert Cynthia Frelund Zoomed in with Jordan (22:42 on podcast) to weigh in on the Cardinals' busy off-season, as well as how star receiver DeAndre Hopkins will fit in Kliff Kingbury's Air Raid offense this season and beyond. 

The Ryan Show FM is broadcasting worldwide! This week Ryan, Mr. Cheeks and Hamptons Dave sat down (Skyped in) with upcoming NYC rapper/comedian Ron Suno. Ron talks about what becoming one of the new faces of Bronx hip hop means to him, his comedic inspirations and the NYC drill scene. Bobby J From Rockaway is back again but this time to promote his all new EP “Endless Summer” produced by Statik Selektah. Nives Gadoni sat down with us on Easter for our first ever Fan Q&A. Last but definitely not least, Taniqua Jones from "Growing Up Hip Hop" joined us to discuss her father ODB's historic legacy and her own business endeavors. Lots of gems on this episode so don't miss a minute! --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app

OPP#9! This week Dann comes to you from Damon Grays house in Omaha. We are joined by Logan and Eric, and Skyped in Dustin Wharton, Jaime Gonzales, and Justin Wadell. This is the most people I have ever had on one podcast. We discuss shop vs mobile and the roots of everyones business. The we open up a discussion about a new concept business building venture Owner’s Pride is shaping u[ to help move the industry forward!

When Facebook live wouldn't party for Jarrod and Mel they jumped over and Skyped! Check out this educational podcast on COVID19 What's happening in the USA How to design your club COVID19 Sales  COVID19 Programming And Much More Check out Jarrod's resources on our private page for gym owners Join Here https://www.facebook.com/gymownersfitnessbusinesspodcast/ https://www.facebook.com/HealthClubDoctor/ Mention to CrankIt Fitness www.crankitfitness.com Mention to Cuoco Black https://www.facebook.com/cuocoblack      

One thing you'll see this season when watching NFL games is artificially pumped in crowd noise. Brad and Eric discussed – neither seem to have a problem with it and both know TV networks will do their best to show no wide stadium shots of mostly empty stands. ESPN's Brian Windhorst shared his radical idea of squeezing the rest of the NBA season and playoff games into the calendar year. Former Hamilton star, now soon-to-be Oregon starting quarterback Tyler Shough (17:37 on podcast) Skyped in to talk about the uncertainty of the CFB season, getting more comfortable at Oregon and how little brother Brady is leaving his own legacy with the Hamilton football program. Plus, Desert Vista QB and Central Florida signee Parker Navarro Skpyed in (27:54 on podcast) as Thursday's 2020 Vision guest. 

Brad and Eric kick around MLB's latest proposal from Monday for an 82-game season which would start in early July. Is this feasible? The two talk about the plusses and minuses and what needs to happen to see a 2020 season. Our ESPN MLB Insider Pedro Gomez (7:11 on podcast) Skyped in saying he only gives the 2020 season a “25-30% chance of happening” due to what many expect to be a standoff between the owners and players. Gomez believes the owners are pushing a 50-50 revenue sharing concept on the players. In turn, the players want to be paid for every game they play. Eric Skyped in Central High two-way star lineman Cristoffer Carillo (25:32 on podcast) as Tuesday's 2020 Vision guest.

The drama continues as the rift between Michael Jordan and Charles Barkley makes public airwaves. Brad and Eric both agree it's time for MJ to get over Barkley's criticism of him when he was running Bobcats. Barkley, as an analyst, is allowed to have an opinion of how Jordan was failing at his job  as an executive. The Athletic's ASU insider and good friend of the show Doug Haller (19:27 on podcast) Skyped in to talk Sun Devil basketball, Eno Benjamin sliding in the NFL draft, the chances of us seeing college football this fall in some capacity and much more. Plus, Eric skyped in with Sunrise Mountain High senior dancer Bre Ferris (35:56 on podcast) for Wednesday's 2020 Vision guest.

Subscribe to my YouTube and watch this interview here.May 5, 2020: Guillaume Liossorgues has created APY. The site says: "Find Your Business Mentor. Connect with C-level, VPs and Directors from all industries to make the right choices and start your future." He's originally from France but is now in Toronto. I'm in Ottawa. It was a nice day out, so I sat on the porch and Skyped him from my phone. He told me about his site. But mostly we had a meandering discussion about how to make money online, whether you can still achieve success and happiness after your 20's, if I'll be able to get Jennifer Lawrence and Barack Obama on my podcast, and whether it's a good flirting move for me to yell to a mom on the street "I'll help you raise your children!"Ways to save money, make money, and support the show:Get a website made by my self-made Internet millionaire friend Lee, designed to make you money. Sign up for info and my newsletter about how to make money online at joshgotit.comFree trial of Amazon Prime (US)Free trial of Amazon Prime (Canada)Free trial of Amazon's KindleShop my recommendations at my Amazon Page: amazon.com/shop/celebrityjoshOr simply click here before Amazon shopping, which will support me at no cost to you:US: go.celebrityjosh.com/amazonCanada: go.celebrityjosh.com/amazon-caBuy my swag: go.celebrityjosh.com/teepublicDeals on my creative tools:Podcast hosting service: SimplecastRemote interview software: SquadcastWebsite hosting service: HostPapaRecording equipment: KitOther ways to make money and save money: celebrityjosh.com/resourcesFollow me at:Facebook ProfileFacebook PageInstagramTwitterLinkedinDonate to support me: Ko-Fi

The there are rumbling Major League Baseball could be returning by the end of June, early July or possibly even earier than both target dates. Does the new 10-team, three-region plan make the most sense? Phoenix Suns great Amar'e Stoudemire (12:40 on podcast) Skyped in from Tel Aviv to discuss a myriad of things including his rise to NBA stardom, his time with the Suns, remembering Kobe Bryant and how he's enjoyed playing basketball overseas. Plus, Eric caught up with South Mountain High two-sport standout Tziaha Quint via Skype (33:39 on podcast). Quint is signed to continue his academic and football career at Rocky Mountain College in Billings, Montana next fall.

The Arizona Cardinals wrapped a nice 2020 NFL Draft over the weekend, which including selecting ASU's Eno Benjamin with their 7th-round pick. Brad and Eric discussed what they liked, disliked for the virtual draft, as well as some of the local players heading to the NFL. NBCSports.com's Peter King (9:56 on podcast) Skyped in from New York with his biggest takeaways from the draft, as well as the Cardinals new haul of talent. NFL Network's Michael Fabiano also Skyped in (32:41 on podcast) and talked fantasy implications from this new rookie crop, including best and worst landing spots. Plus, a full recap of “The Last Dance” espisodes 3 & 4 which aired Sunday night.

Matthew 8:1-17 with guest preacher, Chris Ekins, who Skyped into the live stream. During this time Anchor Church has been live streaming our service. This audio is taken from our live stream. Prefer to watch the live stream? www.anchorchurchcoffs.com/live

The NFL draft is just hours away. How will the teams adapt to the “virtual” expected hiccups? Brad and Eric discuss what and who makes the most sense for the Cardinals and the eighth overall pick. University of Miami Wide Receivers Coach and former ASU Offensive Coordinator Rob Likens (10:15 on podcast) Skyped in to discuss how Brandon Aiyuk's game translates to the NFL, as well as why Herm Edwards parted ways with him back in December. Brad was also joined by new San Tan Charter head coach Kerry Taylor (19:24 on podcast). He discussed his successful yet controversial stay at Arcadia, becoming a new dad and why he feels San Tan Charter is the right fit for him.

The Crambones take their final exam for the semester.

We are one week away from the NFL draft. Who and what makes the most sense for the Arizona Cardinals and the eighth overall pick? NFL on CBS analyst and former Cards' kicker Jay Feely (12:03 on podcast) is helping Valley families in need through our friends at Valle Luna in Chandler. He also discussed the draft and the Cards, as well. University of Alabama Athletic Director Greg Byrne (21:35 on podcast) Skyped in to talk about the future of college football, not only this fall but into 2021, as well. Plus, Thursday's “2020 Vision” guest as Eric caught up with Horizon standout quarterback Jake Martinelli (34:45 on podcast) over Skype. 

Brad and Eric kick around which professional sport will be the best prepared to comeback post-COVID-19. The NBA is looking into a two-week “re-training camp” with a target date potentially late next month. Jeff Passan from ESPN believes MLB is all-in for Arizona and there is no feasible Plan B. Ralph & Chilly from ArizonaVarsity.com (19:40 on podcast) Skyped in to talk how COVID-19 is impacting recruiting, both positively and negatively, as well as if we're going to see high school football this fall. Arcadia High School running back Paxton Earl (32:26 on podcast) was Monday's “2020 Vision” guest. He discussed staying in shape during the quarantine, missing his final semester of high school and his decision to walk on to the University of San Diego next year.

Rob and Joseph discuss Minority Report, the 2002 Steven Spielberg / Tom Cruise blockbuster featuring precrime and a thinky mix of free will, fate, flying cars, and eyeballs. We talk the aesthetics of a 2054 Washington DC, the weirdness of Philip K. Dick adaptations, and Tom Cruise in general on this Skyped-in quarantine-crazy episode of YSGOAT! Support our YSGOAT Patreon HERE and get bonus episodes, our first fifty episodes with commentary, and more! Get your YSGOAT tees, totes, mugs, and more in our store HERE. Check out Rob's Etsy shop to buy his prints, stickers, original artwork, and more HERE.   You can also get a wide variety of Rob Israel tees, totes, mugs, and more in his Teepublic store HERE.

The NFL draft is just three weeks away and Brad is looking forward to a “sports distraction” and what the Cardinals may do with the 8th overall pick now with Nuk Hopkins in the mix at wide receiver. What is the best way to mix up your “daily routine” as we continue to self-quarantine. FOX College Football Analyst and good friend of the show Brock Huard (10:36 on podcast) Skyped in from Seattle to talk about the quarterbacks in this draft class, as well as some NFL news and notes. Romelo White becomes the second Arizona State Sun Devil to turn pro – following Remy Martin from earlier this week. Plus, Sande Charles jumped on the show Thursday (23:27 on podcast) with Brad, as well to preview her “Sande Sez” weekly column and staying physically and mentally healthy during COVID-19..

Due to the coronavirus and everyone on quarantine, we're bringing you a Skyped podcast for the Pewter Nation Podcast between Scott Reynolds and Jon Ledyard for this week. We're just three weeks away from the draft and the guys are doing a full preview of what's to come for the Bucs in the 2020 draft. They got back Ndamukong Suh this year, but that doesn't mean that they shouldn't draft another DT for depth behind them. What about wide receiver? Who's going to take the third slot? There's obviously a lot of discussion these days on offensive tackles and running backs, and the guys give some suggestions outside of the common names you have heard. Plus, there' one wildcard choice for a Bucs' first round pick that you just have to hear. Find out who it is in the new Pewter Nation Podcast.

Back by popular demand (for real, y'all love some spooky spaghetti), we're doing another creepypasta episode! Get ready for interdimensional diners, makeshift graves, and how to lose your soul in an abandoned church. Because of the need for social distancing, we Skyped in for this episode so the quality isn't as good as usual, but we think that just makes these pastas even creepier. The tea we're sippin' on: a variety actually (we didn't coordinate this time) but we still highly recommend getting yourself some August Uncommon teas to soothe yourself during this trying time. (https://august.la/) Connect with us on the socials! Insta: @Conspirateapodcastatl Twits: @TheConspiraTea And, WASH YOUR DAMN HANDS Y'ALL.

I recorded Episode 10 of my podcast 16th February 2020, barely 6 weeks ago. So much has changed since - then, Allie and I hugged, talked for hours right across a table, went for a leisurely lunch - things that are impossible now, to who knows when. I wanted to catch up with Allie see how she was getting on during lockdown, so we Skyped for Episode 11 on 21st March. Allie’s still cranking out her community-led creativity even in the grip of a pandemic, with nightly shows on the Hysteria Ireland Comedy Network on Facebook, so if you’re interested in how a creative persons keeps it all going in the face of a crisis, have a listen to Episode 11 too. Allie O’Rourke - stand-up comedian and comedy promoter - is one of Dublin’s hardest-working comedians, playing over 300 gigs in 18 months all over the country, refining her comedic skillset to reach and entertain everyone who sees her. Caroline appreciates how she’s developing her queer comedy club Token Straight into a recognisable brand, taking it from a Dublin city basement to nationwide, and online to the world - working smart to make it not just for clued-in LBGQT audiences, but for anyone who loves good comedy. They talk about how to maintain the initial creative burst throughout a project, the checklist for a guaranteed killer comedy room, and the importance of supporting others to build a community together. DIY or die!

Allie O’Rourke - stand-up comedian and comedy promoter - is one of Dublin’s hardest-working comedians, playing over 300 gigs in 18 months all over the country, refining her comedic skillset to reach and entertain everyone who sees her. I wanted to catch up with Allie see how she was getting on during lockdown, so we Skyped for Episode 11 on 21st March 2020. Allie’s still cranking out her community-led creativity even in the grip of a pandemic, with nightly shows on the Hysteria Ireland Comedy Network on Facebook. I also spoke with Allie for Episode 10 of Operation: Project, recorded 5 weeks earlier, so if you want to hear how optimistic for the future we were, and what our plans were, do have a listen to Episode 10. So much has changed since - there is a whole a new set of challenges for the creative person to overcome, but just because we can’t be in the same room as our collaborators, we can still support each other and entertain ourselves, and an audience, together.

Some AD's and people of influence believe we may not see an NFL or college football season this fall thanks to COVID-19. How could this impact all college programs who rely on football to off-set costs and expenses for other sports? Former Pinnacle High and Michigan State standout quarterback Brian Lewerke (8:26 on podcast) Skyped in from Michigan to talk about his experience at the NFL Combine, not being able to work out and what he's hoping to prove to NFL scouts and coaches. Jordan Hamm jumped on to talk about a handful of local HS players getting big offers. Plus, keeping kids both mentally and physically sharp during the downtime families are now facing.

Rob and Joseph continue their social distancing with another Skyped-in episode of YSGOAT. This week, we revisit some old friends in the Jay and Silent Bob reboot. We cover their latest movie, as well as the entire view Askewniverse in a quarantined deep dive.  Support our YSGOAT Patreon HERE and get bonus episodes, our first fifty episodes with commentary, and more! Get your YSGOAT tees, totes, mugs, and more in our store HERE. Check out Rob's Etsy shop to buy his prints, stickers, original artwork, and more HERE.   You can also get a wide variety of Rob Israel tees, totes, mugs, and more in his Teepublic store HERE.

All eyes are on Travis Green's deployment of the underachieving Canucks as the stretch drive rolls on. P Mac, Geeta, Ryan and a Skyped in Dave discuss the Canucks' coach concerns and deployment issues. If they miss the playoffs, could the Canucks part ways with Travis Green following some very underwhelming home games? They also discuss the incredible surge of the New York Rangers, Mika Zibanejad's five goal game and the impressive streaks the blue shirts are on. They also look at the Florida Panthers and Minnesota Wild, two teams who made additions by subtractions at the trade deadline and who are scratching and clawing to make it to the post season. They also answer some great listener questions and talk about how the National Hockey League is approaching the serious concern of Coronavirus disease (COVID-19). Support the show on Patreon! Pledge a coupla bucks (or $5) and get instant access to all our bonus content. This week Ryan gets warned about just how spicy his chicken burger is and the gang share their thoughts and encounters with spicy foods. Ryan also discusses how he tricked his sister into buying him a jacket online that Sean Avery recommended, all before P Mac finishes off the segment with the line of the year! Visit www.patreon.com/pucksonnet GET THE NEW PUCKS ON NET T-SHIRT TODAY! Follow us on Twitter  Follow us on InstagramLike us on Facebook Sign up for our email newsletter

The Last Shepherd (Evil Sun Productions) is a Hebrew-language indie comedy adventure scifi fantasy film with elements of Jewish mysticism and kabbalah. Several of the film's creators Skyped with The Book of Life. bookoflifepodcast.com

Believe it or not, folks... Dentists, Implants and Worms have made it to Episode 100!  In celebration of our huge milestone episode, we decided to try out something different by featuring some of our closest friends and supporters on the show.  In short, it didn't go well due to technical difficulties— mainly because the three of us are Skype newbies. (Yeah, we'll work on that.) Regardless of the "shit show" when it came to Skype, we managed to make the best of it by briefly connecting with our biggest fans: Mike Freimuth, DDS; The Dental Hacks Podcast (Alan Mead, DDS and Jason Lipscomb, DDS); Erin Elliott, DDS; Lisa Moler; The Life and Dentistry Podcast; Danny Domingue, DDS. Perhaps, even more notably, The Worm himself— John Landers, DDS— decided to grace us with his presence. I promise you there IS some dental content discussed around the 1 hour 20 minute mark (thank you Dr. Domingue).  All in all though, it was a greatly entertaining podcast and I truly mean it when I say that I've never had so much fun taking around 3 hours of technical difficulties and non-sequiters and cutting it down to a super-sized (1 hour and 40 minutes) episode of Dentists, Implants and Worms. We can't thank ALL 100 of our previous guests enough.  Trust us, if we were able to, we would have Skyped you all in, but as you can tell from listening to this episode, we could barely handle 8 guests, let alone 100. Here's to another 100 episodes of the podcast that navigates you through the world of dentistry, one vodka-soda at a time!  Thank you for listening and supporting us, and cheers!

“The Safety Doc” untangles the conflated terms mainstreaming and inclusion as well as the seemingly synonymous words tolerance and inclusion. A clear-cut definition of each designation postures the listener to grapple with the practices of debate, protests, and the non-aggression principle - all of which are powerful contributors to a society that is safe and orderly for its citizens. Dr. Perrodin's discussion centers the public school context and examples are situated to that context and situation. Let's begin with MAINSTREAMING. Think of a global positioning device worn by each child (just imagine it). In this universe, one can physically pinpoint the location of the student. If the child is located in the “regular education” classroom / specials (art, music PE), lunch, recess then that child is MAINSTREAMED. Mainstreaming does not mean that the child is being included in the classroom curriculum and to claim PASSIVE benefit is an incredible stretch. This is often justified as “exposure” to peers without disabilities. If that is what's happening, then refer to it as what it is - mainstreaming. If Mainstreaming is passive and implied, then INCLUSION is active and explicit. For example, when a child is being included in a regular education setting, he or she is actively engaged in educational instruction and activities and the teacher holds an expectation of academic rigor. Exceptions exist. Dr. Perrodin straddles the line of mainstreaming and inclusion as he describes a girl with an anxiety disorder that “Skyped” into a regular education classroom, but for the most part, there's not much gray between mainstream and inclusion. MYTH OF FULL INCLUSION. Many schools tout a mantra of “We are full inclusion for students with disabilities.” That's simply not accurate - and if it is accurate, then it's out of compliance with the intent of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). TOLERANCE. Simply put, tolerance is adherence to the Non-Aggression Principle. However, tolerance is a basement-level threshold. We are better than tolerance - a term that implies that one has to actively suppress some level of discrimination or rage. Teach Tolerance - really? ACCEPTANCE. This is a step, well, actually a flight of stairs above, mere tolerance. It's a safer distance away from the tinderbox. Acceptance is active. It is seeking to understand another position. The great philosopher Aristotle countered clubs and stones with the art of rhetoric, persuasion and reasoning - in short, Aristotle created the framework for debate. And remember, to be informed of another's position doesn't mandate that you must befriend the other person (or group). Practice acceptance and you will be informed about existing information as well as able to consider newly-presented information that might (or might not) alter your beliefs. FORMATS. You can also listen to this podcast on SoundCloud https://soundcloud.com/user-186592129 or on The 405 Media http://the405media.com/the-safety-doc/ You can view this episode on YouTube https://youtu.be/N2-OIm6qFIw FOLLOW DR. PERRODIN: On Twitter @SafetyPhD and subscribe to “The Safety Doc” YouTube channel and SoundCloud RSS feed. DR. PERRODIN'S SAFETY BLOG: https://crisisprepconsulting.wordpress.com/ SAFETY DOC WEBSITE: www.safetyphd.com David will respond to discussion thread comments or questions & also to emails. The Safety Doc Podcast is hosted & produced by David Perrodin, PhD. ENDORSEMENTS. Opinions are those of the host and guests and do not reflect positions of The 405 Media or supporters of “The Safety Doc Podcast”. The show is curse free and adheres to nondiscrimination principles while seeking to bring forward productive discourse and debate on topics relevant to personal or institutional safety.

Carolyn and Karma are back in your earholes with more talk of RAW. Also, The Producer makes a spirited case for Summer Rae, we find out a bit too much about Carlos (not that Carlos) and completely forget about Twitter. Opening Music: "I Want More" - Suburban Legends

Part Two:  Dave and Chuck talk about a man who Skyped his penis to an entire family and your biggest bonehead move, what is the craziest thing you walked in on, have you ever been part of a citizen's arrest, a list of places men and women like to be touched and where does the taint land on that list, and more!

Kid, Shithead, Pooty and Don Tang welcome back The Judge, JMac jumps in late in the game where we preview some Octomom porno, Kid suggests selling children on Ebay. We ask everyone to assignment America and give us the term that explains what a motorboat to the baby scar would be called. Judge tells us how he ruined his life. How Marriage has lead to tons of masturbation. We give everyone a technique to keep soap out of your goaddamn cock while you jerk it. We put Don and Pooty tang on the spot about their sex life. There's more and you should listen or if you're too goddamn busy to listen call and complain to our Listen Line at 206-202-DEEP (3337).

Reverend Beverly Molander is a Focus Minister through Centers for Spiritual Living, headquartered in Golden, Colorado. Her focus is on the media, and she hosts her weekly radio program, Affirmative Prayer: Activating the Power of YES on the web at www.Unity.FM every Monday, 1-2 p.m. Eastern Time. Each show is archived for listener convenience and is heard all over the world. Beverly interviews leaders in their field, along with every-day people, who use affirmative prayer and/or have chosen to activate the Power of YES in the areas of work, health, prosperity, relationships, or the world. International guests have been Skyped in for interviews from faraway places such as the U.K., Ukraine, Egypt and India.