740: To the Moon!

740: To the Moon!

Author: Jason DeFillippo & Brian Schulmeister with Dave Bittner April 4, 2026 Duration: 1:16:39
Welcome to Grumpy Old Geeks, where we're starting to notice a patience epidemic! As people get used to barking orders at their AI, they're starting to talk to other humans with the same terse impatience. We discuss the enshittification of social media like Threads, which are now completely overrun with AI-generated slop. This week, we dive into the corporate shenanigans of the tech world. OpenAI was caught secretly funding an advocacy group to push for age verification laws that just so happen to benefit Sam Altman's other company. We also cover Elon Musk's troubles, including all of xAI's co-founders quitting, a SpaceX satellite exploding, and Tesla's "fully autonomous" robotaxis being revealed to have remote human drivers. Plus, we celebrate NASA's successful Artemis II launch, review a fantastic Premiere Pro plugin for multicam editing, and give our thoughts on shows like "The Pit" and "Downton Abbey." Sponsors: SquareSpace - go to squarespace.com/GRUMPY for a free trial. And when you’re ready to launch, use code GRUMPY to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. Private Internet Access - Go to GOG.Show/vpn and sign up today. For a limited time only, you can get OUR favorite VPN for as little as $2.03 a month. SetApp - With a single monthly subscription you get 240+ apps for your Mac. Go to SetApp and get started today!!! 1Password - Get a great deal on the only password manager recommended by Grumpy Old Geeks! gog.show/1password Show notes at https://gog.show/740 Watch on YouTube: https://youtu.be/IpzOakbBftY FOLLOW UP Austria is pursuing a social media ban for kids under 14 Group Pushing Age Verification Requirements for AI Turns Out to Be Sneakily Backed by OpenAI OpenAI takes on another “side quest,” buys tech-focused talk show TBPN IN THE NEWS Elon Musk’s last co-founder reportedly leaves xAI SpaceX loses contact with one of its Starlink satellites SpaceX has reportedly filed for the biggest IPO in history OpenAI Is Falling Out of Favor With Secondary Buyers Oracle Lays Off Thousands to Offset AI Spending Anthropic leaks part of Claude Code’s internal source code Anthropic is having a month Wikipedia Just Drew the Line on A.I.-Written Content Tesla Admits Its Robotaxis Are Being Driven Remotely Getting Stuck Inside a Glitching Robotaxi Is a Whole New Thing to Be Scared of White House App Found Tracking Users' Exact Location Every 4.5 Minutes via Third-Party Server Kash Patel's personal email account was accessed by hackers linked to Iran NASA's Artemis II Live Mission Coverage (Official Broadcast) MEDIA CANDY The Hobbit: The Tolkien Edit The Pitt DTF St. Louis Project Hail Mary SUPERGIRL | Official Trailer Downton Abbey Darker Waves Festival APPS & DOODADS Bluesky's next product is an AI assistant that helps build custom social media feeds ChatGPT app launches for CarPlay on iOS 26.4 Apple Removes iPhone Vibe Coding App from App Store Meta is testing an Instagram Plus subscription service with exclusive features Wraith Multi-Cam Editor THE DARK SIDE WITH DAVE Dave Bittner The CyberWire Hacking Humans Caveat Control Loop Only Malware in the Building Current Reader Journalist Sues FAA Over Drone No Fly Zone Designed to Prevent Filming ICE Nicholas Carlini - Black-hat LLMs | [un]prompted 2026 See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

There’s a certain flavor of chaos that defines the technology industry each week, and Grumpy Old Geeks serves as your brutally honest guide through the wreckage. Hosted by Jason DeFillippo, Brian Schulmeister, and Dave Bittner, this isn't a polite roundtable discussion. Instead, it feels like grabbing a drink with friends who have seen it all and have absolutely no patience left for corporate spin or broken promises. They pick apart the biggest tech news stories with a seasoned, cynical eye, always asking the messy questions about what actually went wrong and who should be held accountable. Listening to this podcast is like getting the unfiltered post-mortem from veterans who remember when the internet felt different. The tone is sharp, often funny, and deliberately irreverent-picture a conversation that’s equal parts informed critique and cathartic venting about the state of digital life. You’ll hear them dissect the moves of figures like Elon Musk or Mark Zuckerberg not as distant celebrities, but as players in a ongoing saga of power and missteps. It’s a weekly ritual for anyone who loves technology but is deeply frustrated by the direction it often takes, offering analysis that’s as informed as it is impatient. If you’re tired of sanitized tech commentary and want a take that pulls no punches, this is the place.
Author: Language: English Episodes: 100

Grumpy Old Geeks
Podcast Episodes
749: Surge Bananas [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:16:10
AI companies get sued, tracked, hacked, funded, and IPO'd; governments keep trying to ban kids from screens; Tesla rewrites history while BYD bets money on the future; and somehow the safest place this week is watching s…
748: Space Bone [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 58:52
Self-driving cars drown themselves; AI keeps getting dumber while executives keep firing humans anyway; surveillance capitalism mutates into full sci-fi horror; Jony Ive redesigns Ferrari into an Apple Store accessory; a…
747: Why We Sigh [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:22:52
Social media panic; AI backlash; Musk chaos; robotaxi disasters; crypto collapse; fake-content infestations; Star Wars exhaustion; surveillance capitalism and Gen-Xers desperately trying to back up their hard drives befo…
746: Reality is Frequently Inaccurate [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:19:40
Merch plugs; billionaire AI stupidity; methane-powered robot futures; scammy crypto ghosts; flood-seeking robotaxis; AI morality fanfic; poop surveillance capitalism; Wordle becoming network television; Spotify tracking…
745: Unwanted Senior Discount [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:08:24
Amnesty warns people about visiting America for the World Cup; AI continues speedrunning societal collapse through podcasts, surveillance, fake therapists, layoffs, and murder-planning chatbots; GameStop tries to buy eBa…
744: Goblin Mode [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:23:28
The child social media ban industrial complex expands to Canada while Utah breaks the internet trying to enforce it; a US soldier got arrested for Polymarket insider trading on the Maduro capture; Google sold out to the…
743: Category Five Dystopia [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:18:28
Elon Musk admitted Tesla FSD was vaporware for millions of customers; the AI money squeeze is killing free tiers while xAI drains Memphis's drinking water; Anthropic's Mythos got accessed by hobbyists and adopted by the…
742: Uncouth Yet Highly Litigious [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:25:31
Estonia and Australia prove social media bans don't work; ChatGPT is linked to mass shootings and stalking while also praising fart music; Allbirds pivoted to AI and immediately imploded; France dumped Windows for Linux;…
741: Moon Joy [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:11:24
Greece bans kids from social media (announced on TikTok); the FBI pulls Signal messages from iPhone notifications; OpenAI wants liability shields for AI mass-casualty events; wheels fall off a Mercedes EV; and Dave Bittn…
739: The Thin Black Line [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 59:02
Meta fined $375M for child safety failures. Musk lost 3 lawsuits in a week. Sam Altman compared to a Nazi. Netflix raised prices again. The Pentagon can't quit Claude. Reddit wants your face scan. Star Trek's streaming e…