January 9, 2026 • 28 mins
Would you live in a zero labor home – with a robot? This week, the latest trends and gadgets coming out of CES in Las Vegas and what Karah learned about consenting to biometric surveillance at a Wegmans. Then, Oz takes us to a peptide rave and Karah unveils how influencers and OnlyFans models are getting US visas — they can thank John Lennon.
If you’ve used a chatbot in an unusual or surprising way, send us a 1–2 minute voice note at techstuffpodcast@gmail.com.
Additional Reading:
- What to expect at CES 2026 | The Verge
- NYC Wegmans is storing biometric data on shoppers' eyes, voices and faces | Gothamist
- Chinese Peptides Are The Latest Biohacking Trend In The Tech World | New York Times
- Influencers and OnlyFans models dominate US ‘extraordinary’ artist visas | Financial Times
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
From Kaleidoscope and iHeart podcasts. This is tech stuff. I'm
as Volocian and I'm care Price.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
Today We've got two big stories to break down for you. First,
it's Silicon Valley's Westminster Dog Show. Journalists, tech nerds, industry
insiders are in Vegas this week to check out the
Consumer Electronics Show. Then, is your grocery store spying on you?
Speaker 3 (00:35):
And then a few other things that caught our eye
this week, including Silicon Valley's.
Speaker 4 (00:39):
New rave culture fueled by.
Speaker 3 (00:41):
Chinese peptides and the exceptionally creative influencers and OnlyFans models
getting US visas.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
All of that on the Weekend Tech. It's Friday, January ninth.
Hello Cara, hi Azi, How are you very good?
Speaker 4 (01:00):
Happy New Year, Happy New Year to you too.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
So it's our first Weekend Tech of the year.
Speaker 4 (01:06):
It is very excited.
Speaker 1 (01:08):
Right before the holidays.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
People like to do roundups the best of the year
that went by at the start of the year.
Speaker 1 (01:14):
People like to do.
Speaker 4 (01:15):
What's going to happen?
Speaker 1 (01:16):
What's going to happen?
Speaker 3 (01:17):
I'm you know what my tech prediction is, what I'm
going to be addicted to my father.
Speaker 1 (01:21):
Yeah, that's not a prediction. That's just as a guarantee.
Speaker 4 (01:24):
That's a prophecy.
Speaker 1 (01:25):
I do actually have one big prediction for you. Tell
me so.
Speaker 2 (01:28):
I think that people are going to look back at
twenty twenty six as the year that AI really entered
the physical world. And I think that became quite clear
this week at the Consumer Electronics Show. But I actually
wanted to frame this conversation up about CS with an
essay I read late last year by faith fee Lee.
Speaker 4 (01:49):
Tell me about it.
Speaker 1 (01:49):
Faith a Lee is the godmother of AI. She is
you wrote this blog post.
Speaker 2 (01:54):
The title is from Words to Worlds. Spatial intelligence is
AI's next frontier. To have any idea what that means, I.
Speaker 3 (02:03):
Mean I can guess spatial intelligence meaning like that our
whole world is sort of mapped with AI.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
Pretty much so is machines in the world with sensors,
and it's creating fully simulated worlds that.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
Obey the laws of physics. Basically, faith a Lee made
the case that llms, which power chatbots, are amazing, but
they're kind of almost like trapped in Plato's cave in
a weird way because they're not actually seeing the world.
They're reading text and data that humans or other machines
(02:37):
have recorded about the world and then extrapolating what the
world is like from records of the world, rather than
looking at the world, ingesting it, and understanding its rules
for themselves like humans do. So this is basically what
faith A Lee.
Speaker 2 (02:54):
And a lot of others think might be kind of
the next revolution in computing. It's computers that can actually
understand the world for themselves rather than interpret it based
on descriptions of the world. And she basically has argued
that this will be the next frontiering computing, and that
to really deliver on the Alan Turing thinking machine promise,
it can't just be words and numbers. It has to
(03:15):
be the laws of physics. How gravity is different, how
pressure is different underwater versus on the surface, how a
chair moves around a room when you push it depending
on the fabric of the carpet or the slipperiness of
the floor. Like these are things now that can only
be understood in words, But ultimately she wants to build
machines and algorithms that can understand it for themselves, in
which case this might be the year I think when
(03:38):
thinking machines truly enter the room.
Speaker 4 (03:42):
Well, I was just thinking.
Speaker 3 (03:42):
An incredible thing to think about is I've talked to
you ad nauseum for the last day or two about
my dog that I've been fastering.
Speaker 4 (03:50):
Yeah, and I just think about a new concern.
Speaker 3 (03:53):
That I have all day long, is like what's going
on with this dog when I'm not with this dog?
But like, what if I could have a robot that
could tend to this dog as like a shadow? And
you're thinking about, like, oh, how does the physical world
interact with the robot world?
Speaker 4 (04:08):
Like imagine a dog is like I have my mom
or I have my dad, and then I have.
Speaker 3 (04:13):
My robot Alpha, who is like the robot self that
takes care of the dog too.
Speaker 1 (04:17):
And who's the real boss You're at the robot.
Speaker 3 (04:19):
Yeah, that's when robots take When dogs are.
Speaker 1 (04:22):
Listening to the dog, you and the robot are standing
next to each other and you're like.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
Come here, come here, pal, and the dog goes up
to the robot.
Speaker 1 (04:30):
That's that's the future.
Speaker 3 (04:31):
That is that's when humans, by the way, dogs answering
to robots is when humans will really be like, we
got to get these robots out of the question.
Speaker 1 (04:40):
I think that's right. What about you do you have
any twenty twenty.
Speaker 3 (04:44):
These predictions, Well, this is not a prediction that I've invented.
This is a prediction that's based on a lot of
reading that I've done on Business Insider and the Ft and.
Speaker 1 (04:53):
Showing off.
Speaker 4 (04:55):
Sor Tim Cook. I think is going to step down
from Apple.
Speaker 2 (04:58):
I saw a headline about that. I didn't dive too
deep on it. What are people saying.
Speaker 3 (05:02):
He's nearing retirement age, which, you know, it's not something
that's going to be like a hostile takeover, you know.
I think it's not going to be something that the
average person like finds perceptible as far as change. I
think that he will step down and kind of lead
from behind the scenes. A lah a Jeff Bezos, I
mean it's a hard job.
Speaker 2 (05:23):
I guess Apple's obviously a behemoth. And you know, the
iPhone sales have been robust. The other stuff they've tried,
like the vision pro goggles they've stepped back from the
car never happened.
Speaker 1 (05:32):
The TV thing is kind of I mean, it's not.
Speaker 3 (05:34):
You know what I was actually thinking about it apples
TV has worked, like if you look at the Emmys
and the Critics' Choice Awards and the Golden globes like
they've kind of dominated this year. True in a way
that I mean, I don't know if you would attribute
that to Tim Cook necessarily.
Speaker 2 (05:48):
But I guess if he could choose an Emmy or
having invented chet GPTR.
Speaker 1 (05:54):
Respectology colleagues on the West Coast.
Speaker 4 (05:56):
That's absolutely true. That's absolutely true.
Speaker 3 (05:59):
You know. The other thing is that, speaking of our
friends in Hollywood, the thing that I've noticed a lot
of retired men do is they start production companies because
they like to be in the entertainment business. So who knows,
maybe Tim Apple will start a production company with Apple Studios.
Speaker 4 (06:14):
I have no idea.
Speaker 1 (06:15):
So yes, my prediction is the robot will enter the
room and yours this Tim Apple will exit the room.
Speaker 4 (06:20):
That's right, Okay, perfect.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
One tech CEO. I don't think it's going anywhere, is Jensen.
Speaker 4 (06:26):
He's not going back to Dennis.
Speaker 1 (06:27):
He's not going back to Denny's.
Speaker 4 (06:29):
I wonder if he passes Denny's and he's like, I can't.
Speaker 1 (06:32):
No, I'm sure.
Speaker 2 (06:32):
I feel like it's a big part of his mythology.
He was at the Consumer Electronics Show this week, of
coursees delivering a keynote, and I count with my twenty
twenty six prediction before I read his remarks, which is
probably quite dumb, but because he is remarked, luckily we're
in line with my twenty twenty six prediction. He said
this will be the year when there's a chet GPT
(06:54):
moment for physical AI. This is not a disinterested statement.
Because Nvidio also announced they're getting into the self driving
car business.
Speaker 1 (07:01):
Yes, I saw that, and this is.
Speaker 2 (07:03):
Pretty interesting because previously you had Tesla sales falling Waymo
as the dominant players in US self driving robotaxis, and
it seemed like a two horse race. But part of
in Vidia's announcement was a partnership with Mercedes where they're
basically going to plug their software into other car makers.
Speaker 4 (07:23):
They're in the car business.
Speaker 2 (07:24):
They're not in the car business, but they're all of
a sudden kind of a competitor to their clients, right,
which is really interesting.
Speaker 4 (07:30):
That is very interesting. Do you think it's something that's
going to work.
Speaker 1 (07:34):
I wouldn't.
Speaker 2 (07:35):
I mean you you're you're the Innvidia shareholder that's against
your dear leader.
Speaker 1 (07:39):
No, No, I wouldn't.
Speaker 3 (07:40):
And I think it's very smart to not actually be
in the car design business. I think it's very smart
to like put your software in a pre existing car.
Speaker 2 (07:47):
Probably if you're if you're Mercedes who are doing the partnership,
or other auto makers, you're like, oh, this like a hail.
Mary's well, I think we have a chance of plugging
this in and catching up, which is which is really
really interesting. But he wasn't just talking about this self
driving car partnership. He was pointing at this kind of
robotic revolution. He likes hanging out with robots. We talked
about Earli last year. Remember he got the high five
from the humanoid robot.
Speaker 4 (08:08):
On his trip I Do, I Do?
Speaker 2 (08:11):
And another king of the self driving car world, Elon
himself is kind of seemingly more interested in.
Speaker 1 (08:17):
Humanoid robots than self driving cars. Now he's moved on,
he's moved on.
Speaker 2 (08:21):
He's definitely this time last year, optimist robot was hanging
out with Kim, and it seemed last year like a
pure gimmick. And now twelve months later there's a big
Wall Street Journal story saying that Elon is pivoting the
whole business to be human optimist robots.
Speaker 1 (08:34):
So it is interesting as this year I'd like to
meet Kim. This year we'll see.
Speaker 2 (08:40):
So humanoid robots stole the show at CS this year.
Speaker 1 (08:44):
Did you see any of the videos?
Speaker 4 (08:45):
Yes?
Speaker 1 (08:46):
What did you? What did you see?
Speaker 4 (08:48):
I think it was? Was it Tesla that I saw?
Speaker 1 (08:50):
You? Mintioned Tesla. I'm going to show you Boston Dynamics.
Speaker 3 (08:53):
Dynamics, Yes, show me the spot the dog famously they did.
Speaker 1 (08:57):
They've now got Atlas, the person a.
Speaker 4 (09:00):
Booty hun her.
Speaker 1 (09:01):
What are you seeing?
Speaker 4 (09:02):
So I'm seeing the biggest nerd on the planet.
Speaker 3 (09:05):
It kind of reminds me of Elizabeth Holmes when something
good happens with Faranos coming out and doing like one
of those like kick dancers.
Speaker 2 (09:13):
It's an extremely flexible humanoid robot doing cotwheels, doing Russian
Cossack dancing.
Speaker 1 (09:19):
That is what it is, russian'd.
Speaker 4 (09:21):
Yeah, it's incredible that they've trained them to do this.
Speaker 2 (09:24):
It is And so Hyundai, who actually bought Boston Dynamics
lost this robot Atlas.
Speaker 1 (09:31):
It can lift up to one hundred and ten pounds.
Speaker 2 (09:33):
It can work in temperatures between minus four degrees fahrenheit
up to one hundred and four degrees.
Speaker 4 (09:38):
Assud of the problem of needing cooling centers.
Speaker 1 (09:40):
You don't and actually the battery is pretty amazing as well.
Speaker 2 (09:42):
Last time, like when humanoid robots were last on sixty minutes,
had these huge hunchback of notre.
Speaker 1 (09:47):
Dam story packs, battery packs.
Speaker 2 (09:49):
But now it's just a pure human form essentially, which
is kind of interesting. They're planning to produce thirty thousand
of these robots per year, with the goal of them
working on factory flos by twenty twenty eight.
Speaker 4 (10:01):
They're like, humans can't work in hard enough environments. We
need to make robot.
Speaker 1 (10:05):
Well, I mean, I guess.
Speaker 4 (10:05):
It's a that's a good thing.
Speaker 1 (10:07):
It could be a good thing.
Speaker 2 (10:08):
I mean, I look, I don't know if these are
actually going to replace humans on the factory floor, but
certainly they've got everyone talking about Hyundai for the first
time in a while, I don't talk about human So
those are humanoid robots designed by Hyundai to be factory workers. LG,
another South Korean tech firm, also made waves of cs
(10:28):
this year with its robot called Cloyd Cloud. Lloyd claud
Lloyd Cloud exactly, which ladders up to a vision.
Speaker 1 (10:37):
Do you know what the vision is?
Speaker 4 (10:38):
What is the vision?
Speaker 1 (10:39):
The zero labor home that's I'm looking for.
Speaker 3 (10:42):
I was just thinking, if I have to do another
load of laundry, like it's Sissifian the cloud.
Speaker 1 (10:47):
Literally Cloyd literally does the laundry.
Speaker 4 (10:49):
Can I try this?
Speaker 1 (10:50):
Yeah, of course, Eliza.
Speaker 2 (10:53):
Cloyd can remove dishes from the dishwasher, what heat up
food in the oven? This is this is not a
domestic home now, this is domestic laborer.
Speaker 4 (11:01):
Oh my god.
Speaker 2 (11:02):
It can interact seamlessly with other LG devices like your
fridge and your cooker.
Speaker 3 (11:07):
So it is the connected home that then has the
robot that's running your connected.
Speaker 2 (11:10):
The robot is the is the conductor to the symphony
of your connected home.
Speaker 4 (11:15):
Not particularly opposed to this, I got to.
Speaker 2 (11:16):
Say these were of the only humanoid robots who took
CS by storm. There was also the switchbot one row
h one that can fill a coffee machine, make breakfast,
wash the windows. And then there's the one EX Neo robot.
This one is kind of interesting because it doesn't have
the best fine motor control, which I think is true
(11:38):
of all of these robots. So if you have a
one X Neo robot in your home, you have to
consent to the fact that it will sometimes switch into
a mode where it's being human controlled, so there will
be somebody looking through your robot into your home, wearing
some kind of like haptic suit, doing what the robot
(11:58):
needs to do.
Speaker 1 (12:00):
It's like Avatar.
Speaker 2 (12:01):
Can you imagine buying your robot and then having somebody
sitting four thousand miles away in your house, yes, doing
your domestic.
Speaker 4 (12:10):
Robots.
Speaker 2 (12:11):
The jobs created by robots are people working thousands of
miles away to operate robots in your home.
Speaker 1 (12:17):
It's a bizarre Also.
Speaker 2 (12:19):
Like I wouldn't really want camera in my home, which
is external.
Speaker 3 (12:24):
And we'll talk about this in my next story. But
there are also places where I don't want cameras.
Speaker 1 (12:27):
Yeah, I want to hear about that.
Speaker 2 (12:29):
Just before we turn away from CS, there was some
other robots which are pretty cool but not humanoid. Tell
me there's the anchor Uphie s two vacuum. It's rumba
with them up and it can travel between carpeted areas,
then go to the hard floor to mop it, come
back to the carpeted area. No water spilled, anything like that.
(12:51):
And Cara has an aromatherapy.
Speaker 4 (12:54):
Diffuser, Oh my god.
Speaker 2 (12:56):
And then finally smart fridges which can scan your empty
packages and add them to a shopping list for the
next grocery run. So it's a camera inside the fridge
that accesses an app while shopping, so.
Speaker 1 (13:09):
Kind of remind you either on nine or in the
real world. Yeah, or you need to buy it.
Speaker 3 (13:13):
I mean it is like on a macro level, pretty
incredible the way in which technology is like filling the
gaps and what humans can do, and also just like
taking care of time, Like all these things are very
time intensive. The question is is like is it time
that we want to eradicate, Like do we want to not.
Speaker 4 (13:29):
Go to the grocery store. What are we supposed to
be doing instead.
Speaker 1 (13:34):
Working on our computer?
Speaker 4 (13:36):
Exactly?
Speaker 2 (13:36):
That is the conundrum of the I have to work
all the time, so then when do I do things
which are non compensated labor but very important, like yeah,
the house up is that? That's like, yes, so I
never I never do the things that I need to
do which are not directly work related, Like I have
such a long list of annoying personal things.
Speaker 4 (13:54):
We call it personal ad personal admin.
Speaker 1 (13:56):
Yes, I never get through it. Yes, I don't know if,
but it doesn't tend to be still if the robot
could do not yet not yet.
Speaker 3 (14:02):
I mean I still think the idea of like, I
live in an apartment building where not only humans live,
but a humanoid robot lives.
Speaker 4 (14:08):
Like how far out are we on.
Speaker 2 (14:09):
That you will go to somebody's house this year, I bet,
and they'll have a robot.
Speaker 4 (14:13):
That's crazy. Okay, we'll see. I obviously did not get
to Cees this week. I did, though, get to Wegmans.
Speaker 1 (14:22):
The grocery store, yes, the grocery.
Speaker 3 (14:24):
Store, because I read this article in the Gothamis that
the grocery store chain was using facial recognition software in
their NYC location.
Speaker 1 (14:32):
Well wow, what did the goemists find out about this?
Speaker 3 (14:35):
So actually, a city law in twenty twenty one requires
stores to put up a sign if they use facial
recognition software, so Wegmans complied. The funny thing is I
went to Wegmans, and I really had to search for
this sign. And Wegmans might disagree with me because there
was a sign on the door, But the way in
(14:55):
which I had to look for it, because it was
like sliding in and out of view on the automatic door,
really made me laugh.
Speaker 2 (15:02):
So you went to Wegmans looking for the sign, you
hadn't been looking for the sign, you wouldn't have seen it.
Speaker 3 (15:07):
So there were people that I talked to and I
pointed out the sign to them when I went to
the store, and they were like, no, I.
Speaker 4 (15:13):
Didn't notice that.
Speaker 1 (15:13):
I didn't recognize that.
Speaker 4 (15:14):
I didn't see that.
Speaker 3 (15:15):
Because if you're not looking for it, I think we're
so used to just seeing signs up and if there
don't apply, Like, I've never looked at pet signs until recently.
Speaker 1 (15:23):
So you found the sign. What did it say?
Speaker 3 (15:25):
It said, quote biometric identifier information collected at this location. Then,
in much finer print, quote Wegman's Food Market, Inc. Collects, retains, converts, stores,
or shares customers biometric identifier information, which may include facial recognition,
(15:46):
eye scans, and voice prints.
Speaker 2 (15:48):
Of those two verbs, converts and shares stand out to
me as convert, I'm like converts into what shares with whom?
Speaker 3 (15:55):
So Gofmus actually asked Wegmans about how they were storing
the data, how long they were storing it for, and
how the company would share this data with law enforcement.
Speaker 4 (16:05):
Surprise surprise, Wegmans did.
Speaker 2 (16:07):
Not reply, Okay, what you've been been bearing the leave
for a while. Now.
Speaker 1 (16:12):
What this is is this? What is this is a
customer retention to safety thing safety.
Speaker 3 (16:17):
Yes, so the sign says, quote, we use facial recognition
technology to protect the safety and security of our patrons
and employees and do not lease, trade, or otherwise profit
from the transfer of biometric identify or information.
Speaker 2 (16:34):
It is interesting because like in New York they now
have like you know these like plastic.
Speaker 4 (16:39):
Covers on everything in CBS.
Speaker 1 (16:41):
So that you can't sell the people shoplift.
Speaker 4 (16:43):
I mean, this is just replacing the old Have you seen.
Speaker 1 (16:46):
This person right now?
Speaker 4 (16:48):
You know what I mean?
Speaker 3 (16:48):
Like, you go into any bodega or any sort of
like smoke shop and there's been a shoplifter and they
have a photo from the camera that is so blurry
that you can't even see if this person is a person. Now,
what we have is a company that has a lot
of money to invest in software and basically they can
capture any face and cross reference that face if that
(17:10):
face has been known to shoplift.
Speaker 2 (17:12):
Yeah, but it's also like if you haven't been shoplifting.
Like the idea that you can be personally identified every
time you go into a shop and cross reference to
older weird.
Speaker 1 (17:22):
It's like, you know, you didn't leave your wallet in
the shop.
Speaker 2 (17:25):
You left your whole identity there that's right to be shared, converted,
and whatever else that will.
Speaker 3 (17:30):
It's just a very strange phenomenon. So I actually talked
to a few people, and luckily I had a very
intelligent woman who had seen the same Gothmass article I had.
I approached her and said to her, you, did you
know that facial recognition technology was being used at this Wegman?
She said, I knew it was being used at Wegmans.
I thought it was at the Wegmans in Brooklyn, and
(17:50):
that she actually hadn't clocked the side in the Manhattan store.
The only reason she knew about it was because she
had read the Gothmist article.
Speaker 1 (17:56):
I want to hear the tape.
Speaker 3 (17:58):
Do you feel comfortable with your biometrics oatomy collected by
a large grocery stoarch?
Speaker 5 (18:01):
I know, I actually had the thought right as I
walked in here. I was like, maybe I should put
my little scarf around my field wearing.
Speaker 4 (18:07):
A really cute scarf right now.
Speaker 5 (18:08):
Maybe you should use it or like a giant pair
of sunglasses. Yeah no, I mean, I guess the way
I feel about it is like I'm not sure that
it is going to impact me personally. In any real way.
But I think there are certain people for whom it's
really bad. Yeah, you know, I'm like a white lady who.
Speaker 1 (18:26):
Is like.
Speaker 5 (18:28):
Economically mobile, and so I'm sort of like not worried
about it for myself, which I guess is why I
still came in here. But on principle, yeah, I think
it's bad.
Speaker 3 (18:39):
You know, it's actually interesting she was wearing this kind
of cravat that was this little cashmir brown scarf, and
her idea to cover her face with a scarf is
actually a good one. Four or four recently published an
article about anti surveillance design, which you and I have
talked about, remember in terms of three M and the
Hong Kong protests.
Speaker 1 (18:57):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (18:57):
Four. A fourth point is like, facial recognition tech is complicated,
but actually tricking it is very easy and the most
effective tool you can use to trick facial recognition technology
is actually a mask.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
Is Wegman's an outlier here or the other? I mean
this you big quich is?
Speaker 2 (19:10):
I know, for example, when you go to the airport,
you can sometimes shop with your.
Speaker 4 (19:14):
First like the f out Actually no, it's not just Wegmans.
Speaker 3 (19:18):
There are stores of Albertson's Walmart, Kroger's are all using
it in some of their locations.
Speaker 4 (19:23):
I think also Home Depot, Low's, Macy's. I mean, I
think a lot of people won't care.
Speaker 3 (19:29):
Yeah, and a lot of people will just say, I've
been surveilled. What is this, as we used to say,
a little sprinkle of lder going to do to my
day to day? If I'm not someone who should be
worried about shoplifting, And to that, I say, what if
it's not forever about shoplifting?
Speaker 4 (19:44):
Right after the break, the P.
Speaker 3 (19:51):
And GLP ones are having a moment and only fans
models are getting very special US visas.
Speaker 1 (19:57):
Stay with us and we're back. Does the word peptide
mean anything to you?
Speaker 3 (20:08):
My friends are always like the peptides, the peptides and my
skincare and the peptide what I think they use skincare
that have like peptides that titans their face.
Speaker 1 (20:17):
Have they been to peptide raves apps?
Speaker 3 (20:19):
I mean, unless you're talking about the their bathroom now.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
Well.
Speaker 2 (20:24):
The New York Times had a great story this week
with the headline Chinese peptides are the latest biohacking trend
in the tech world. It had one source saying quote
the elites all have a Chinese peptide dealer, and it
follows several Silicon Valley workers, all between twenty and forty
who are buying unregulated peptides from China with the hope
(20:45):
that it will improve their health, their sleep, their fitness,
and their focus.
Speaker 1 (20:49):
But what is it?
Speaker 4 (20:50):
I mean? I know peptides are like protein.
Speaker 2 (20:53):
What is Peptides are amino acids that regulate hormones in
the body and reduce in flammation, which is why it's
a popular ingredient I learned in skin care products. It's
also and I didn't know this embarrassingly, the P in
GLP one.
Speaker 3 (21:09):
I didn't know that just until this very moment. So
the p peptides improve health.
Speaker 4 (21:15):
They're good. People like them, But why do they like them? Like,
what do people say that they do?
Speaker 2 (21:20):
People are claiming that different types of peptides work for
different types of ailments.
Speaker 1 (21:26):
Peptides is like.
Speaker 2 (21:27):
A catsual term for these collections of amino acids, and
people are using all kinds of different peptides for different purposes.
So people say that these peptides can stimulate wound healing
with by stimulating new blood vessel growth, better sleep, of course,
weight loss, increase focus. One of the weirdest things was
improving eye contact. Quote from the story, One Open AI
(21:50):
researcher called it a zepic for autism. There have been
some negative side effects. One woman in the New York
Times story had all her hair fall out bad Two
women will hostpit life with swollen tongues and racing hearts
after shooting up on peptides at an anti aging festival
in Vegas.
Speaker 4 (22:07):
Just like the worst case scenario use.
Speaker 1 (22:09):
Well, in the worst case scenario is probably you die.
Speaker 3 (22:12):
Right, So I'm just saying like in terms of like
people who are using glps are not generally like going
to shoot them up festivals.
Speaker 2 (22:20):
Well, that's what this is about. These raves are like
basically people are going to these parties with DJs where
all of these peptides, a DJ and a peptide, all
of these peptides are available, and somebody else is teaching
you how to make your own peptide cocktail. The time
(22:41):
that you went through a few of these raves, and
there are pictures of the raves in the article. People
are like have a needle in their arm with tape
with like a disco background.
Speaker 4 (22:51):
Oh so they can just like get fed, get fed peptides.
Speaker 1 (22:54):
Yeah yeah, Is this legal. It's kind of in a
gray area.
Speaker 2 (22:58):
Personal use is legal, and buying directly from suppliers is legal,
but very few peptides are FDA approved, and so biohackers
are very much injecting at their own risk. As the
woman whose hair fell out may testify. What's kind of
interesting is this is not as niche as you might imagine.
Speaker 4 (23:19):
The rave piece isn't the rave piece.
Speaker 1 (23:21):
Is pretty niche.
Speaker 2 (23:21):
In fact, you look at the photos in the New
York Times, it's like only a New York Times journalist
could describe that as.
Speaker 1 (23:25):
A rave It's like four people in a room with
purple light.
Speaker 4 (23:29):
Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah yeah yeah.
Speaker 2 (23:31):
But as a party, I guess at best, imports of
peptides and hormones from China doubled.
Speaker 4 (23:38):
I was going to ask why China, and then I
was like, I know the yes they make.
Speaker 2 (23:41):
So in twenty twenty four, there were one hundred and
sixty four million dollars worth of Chinese peptides imported to
the US in the first three quarters of the year.
In twenty twenty five, three hundred and twenty eight million
exactly double, which is three twenty million dollars of Chinese peptides.
Speaker 4 (23:59):
Which makes you one, does it work or is there
just hype?
Speaker 1 (24:03):
I mean JLP's work.
Speaker 4 (24:04):
Have you ever had an I.
Speaker 2 (24:07):
Listen, Honestly reading the article, I was like, Wow, if
I had a lot more time on my hands and
I was a little bit more crazed, I can easily
imagine going down this rabbit hole.
Speaker 3 (24:18):
Yeah here all you kind of can, though, just with
like very cursory use of GLP wan like a lot
of people, I mean basically everybody.
Speaker 1 (24:26):
I know. Yeah, I'm also exploring. You're exploring I.
Speaker 4 (24:29):
Am exploring wait no, for mental health benefits.
Speaker 2 (24:32):
So that was one of the things mentioned in the article,
microdosing GLPS for mental health. But you know, it's like
the promise that rather than like going to the gym
four times a week and meditating for forty five minutes
a day and going on a walk and looking at the.
Speaker 3 (24:47):
Sky back to your it goes back to what you're saying,
which is this list of all the stuff that you
have to do when you're not working is really hard
to do, Like, can I achieve it with this coat that.
Speaker 1 (24:59):
I can buy on line? Yes, so it's tempting.
Speaker 2 (25:01):
I actually, luckily I don't have enough time to go
down the rabbit hole, but I but I can imagine.
Speaker 1 (25:06):
I can imagine maybe you could have a robot that
could stranger things.
Speaker 4 (25:09):
Stranger things.
Speaker 3 (25:10):
Absolutely, I want to pivot. But do you consider yourself
an exceptional creative?
Speaker 1 (25:18):
Have you been reading my LinkedIn again?
Speaker 3 (25:20):
I've been reading your thoughts because I take Pepta and
I read this article that said influencers and only fans
models dominate the US extraordinary artist visa, and I thought
of you.
Speaker 1 (25:31):
I saw that story. I didn't read it, but I'm
glad to bring it up.
Speaker 4 (25:34):
And you know why I thought of you.
Speaker 1 (25:35):
Because I had one visa.
Speaker 4 (25:37):
It was not because you were selling feed picks.
Speaker 2 (25:39):
I was reached for a time deemed by the US
government an extraordinary artist.
Speaker 4 (25:44):
So do you know where this this I learned for
the first time reporting the story. Do you know where
it came from? The one visa came from no idea.
Speaker 3 (25:51):
So these visas were created because in the nineteen seventies,
the Nixon administration was trying to deport John Lennon put
over his politics. But Lenin was able to stay in
the US because he was deemed an outstanding person in
the arts and science.
Speaker 1 (26:06):
So you and John Lennon, Wow, and now a lot
of only fans.
Speaker 4 (26:10):
Creators and boy George and Shinnan O'Connor wow. Yes.
Speaker 3 (26:14):
The FT reports that currently an overwhelming number of people
getting approved for OH one visas are influencers and OnlyFans models.
One lawyer who was interviewed called them scroll kings and
I love, I.
Speaker 4 (26:27):
Really love scroll kings and queens.
Speaker 3 (26:30):
The number of scroll kings and queens has actually, like
peptide use, doubled since twenty ten.
Speaker 2 (26:37):
Wow, and why is applicants looked upon so favorably by
the case officers at the United States Citizenship and Immigration
Services Bureau.
Speaker 3 (26:46):
Some immigration lawyers said that follower account makes a difference.
The visa process is complicated and requires a lot of paperwork.
Speaker 2 (26:53):
No, been true, But that's interesting at the follow account
because much like with the large iguage models, where if
it doesn't exist in writing, doesn't exist. Yeah, in your
one visa application, it doesn't exist if you can't measure
it well. You need to come up with all of
these very concrete numbers to demonstrate reach and influence and
blah blah, blah so and who.
Speaker 3 (27:14):
Can demonstrate reach and influence better than an influencer or
someone with an only fans account, no one, you know.
I think there are other people who have these visas
who might be able to say, Okay, I'm in a
major film or I'm in theater productions, you know, and
get recommendations from experts in their field. These only fans
models and influencers are like, look, I have twenty million followers,
(27:35):
let me stay in the country.
Speaker 1 (27:37):
And how many exceptional talent visas are given out each year?
Speaker 4 (27:41):
Are you fishing?
Speaker 3 (27:45):
Only twenty thousand visas were granted in twenty twenty four,
and the majority of visas are still h one b's yeah,
your exception. That's it for this week for tech stuff,
(28:06):
I'm Karra Price.
Speaker 1 (28:06):
And I'm os Vloschin.
Speaker 2 (28:07):
This episode was produced by Eliza Dennis and Melissa Slaughter.
It was executive produced by me Caarra Price, Julian Nutta,
and Kate Osborne for Kaleidoscope and Katrina.
Speaker 1 (28:17):
Novelle for iHeart Podcasts.
Speaker 2 (28:19):
The engineer is Mike Coscarelli and Jack Insley mikes this episode.
Speaker 1 (28:23):
Kyle Murdoch wrote our theme.
Speaker 3 (28:25):
Song, Please rate, review and Reach out to us at
tech Stuff Podcast at.
Speaker 4 (28:29):
Gmail dot com. We want to hear from.
Speaker 3 (28:31):
You'll
From Kaleidoscope and iHeart podcasts. This is tech stuff. I'm
as Volocian and I'm care Price.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
Today We've got two big stories to break down for you. First,
it's Silicon Valley's Westminster Dog Show. Journalists, tech nerds, industry
insiders are in Vegas this week to check out the
Consumer Electronics Show. Then, is your grocery store spying on you?
Speaker 3 (00:35):
And then a few other things that caught our eye
this week, including Silicon Valley's.
Speaker 4 (00:39):
New rave culture fueled by.
Speaker 3 (00:41):
Chinese peptides and the exceptionally creative influencers and OnlyFans models
getting US visas.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
All of that on the Weekend Tech. It's Friday, January ninth.
Hello Cara, hi Azi, How are you very good?
Speaker 4 (01:00):
Happy New Year, Happy New Year to you too.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
So it's our first Weekend Tech of the year.
Speaker 4 (01:06):
It is very excited.
Speaker 1 (01:08):
Right before the holidays.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
People like to do roundups the best of the year
that went by at the start of the year.
Speaker 1 (01:14):
People like to do.
Speaker 4 (01:15):
What's going to happen?
Speaker 1 (01:16):
What's going to happen?
Speaker 3 (01:17):
I'm you know what my tech prediction is, what I'm
going to be addicted to my father.
Speaker 1 (01:21):
Yeah, that's not a prediction. That's just as a guarantee.
Speaker 4 (01:24):
That's a prophecy.
Speaker 1 (01:25):
I do actually have one big prediction for you. Tell
me so.
Speaker 2 (01:28):
I think that people are going to look back at
twenty twenty six as the year that AI really entered
the physical world. And I think that became quite clear
this week at the Consumer Electronics Show. But I actually
wanted to frame this conversation up about CS with an
essay I read late last year by faith fee Lee.
Speaker 4 (01:49):
Tell me about it.
Speaker 1 (01:49):
Faith a Lee is the godmother of AI. She is
you wrote this blog post.
Speaker 2 (01:54):
The title is from Words to Worlds. Spatial intelligence is
AI's next frontier. To have any idea what that means, I.
Speaker 3 (02:03):
Mean I can guess spatial intelligence meaning like that our
whole world is sort of mapped with AI.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
Pretty much so is machines in the world with sensors,
and it's creating fully simulated worlds that.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
Obey the laws of physics. Basically, faith a Lee made
the case that llms, which power chatbots, are amazing, but
they're kind of almost like trapped in Plato's cave in
a weird way because they're not actually seeing the world.
They're reading text and data that humans or other machines
(02:37):
have recorded about the world and then extrapolating what the
world is like from records of the world, rather than
looking at the world, ingesting it, and understanding its rules
for themselves like humans do. So this is basically what
faith A Lee.
Speaker 2 (02:54):
And a lot of others think might be kind of
the next revolution in computing. It's computers that can actually
understand the world for themselves rather than interpret it based
on descriptions of the world. And she basically has argued
that this will be the next frontiering computing, and that
to really deliver on the Alan Turing thinking machine promise,
it can't just be words and numbers. It has to
(03:15):
be the laws of physics. How gravity is different, how
pressure is different underwater versus on the surface, how a
chair moves around a room when you push it depending
on the fabric of the carpet or the slipperiness of
the floor. Like these are things now that can only
be understood in words, But ultimately she wants to build
machines and algorithms that can understand it for themselves, in
which case this might be the year I think when
(03:38):
thinking machines truly enter the room.
Speaker 4 (03:42):
Well, I was just thinking.
Speaker 3 (03:42):
An incredible thing to think about is I've talked to
you ad nauseum for the last day or two about
my dog that I've been fastering.
Speaker 4 (03:50):
Yeah, and I just think about a new concern.
Speaker 3 (03:53):
That I have all day long, is like what's going
on with this dog when I'm not with this dog?
But like, what if I could have a robot that
could tend to this dog as like a shadow? And
you're thinking about, like, oh, how does the physical world
interact with the robot world?
Speaker 4 (04:08):
Like imagine a dog is like I have my mom
or I have my dad, and then I have.
Speaker 3 (04:13):
My robot Alpha, who is like the robot self that
takes care of the dog too.
Speaker 1 (04:17):
And who's the real boss You're at the robot.
Speaker 3 (04:19):
Yeah, that's when robots take When dogs are.
Speaker 1 (04:22):
Listening to the dog, you and the robot are standing
next to each other and you're like.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
Come here, come here, pal, and the dog goes up
to the robot.
Speaker 1 (04:30):
That's that's the future.
Speaker 3 (04:31):
That is that's when humans, by the way, dogs answering
to robots is when humans will really be like, we
got to get these robots out of the question.
Speaker 1 (04:40):
I think that's right. What about you do you have
any twenty twenty.
Speaker 3 (04:44):
These predictions, Well, this is not a prediction that I've invented.
This is a prediction that's based on a lot of
reading that I've done on Business Insider and the Ft and.
Speaker 1 (04:53):
Showing off.
Speaker 4 (04:55):
Sor Tim Cook. I think is going to step down
from Apple.
Speaker 2 (04:58):
I saw a headline about that. I didn't dive too
deep on it. What are people saying.
Speaker 3 (05:02):
He's nearing retirement age, which, you know, it's not something
that's going to be like a hostile takeover, you know.
I think it's not going to be something that the
average person like finds perceptible as far as change. I
think that he will step down and kind of lead
from behind the scenes. A lah a Jeff Bezos, I
mean it's a hard job.
Speaker 2 (05:23):
I guess Apple's obviously a behemoth. And you know, the
iPhone sales have been robust. The other stuff they've tried,
like the vision pro goggles they've stepped back from the
car never happened.
Speaker 1 (05:32):
The TV thing is kind of I mean, it's not.
Speaker 3 (05:34):
You know what I was actually thinking about it apples
TV has worked, like if you look at the Emmys
and the Critics' Choice Awards and the Golden globes like
they've kind of dominated this year. True in a way
that I mean, I don't know if you would attribute
that to Tim Cook necessarily.
Speaker 2 (05:48):
But I guess if he could choose an Emmy or
having invented chet GPTR.
Speaker 1 (05:54):
Respectology colleagues on the West Coast.
Speaker 4 (05:56):
That's absolutely true. That's absolutely true.
Speaker 3 (05:59):
You know. The other thing is that, speaking of our
friends in Hollywood, the thing that I've noticed a lot
of retired men do is they start production companies because
they like to be in the entertainment business. So who knows,
maybe Tim Apple will start a production company with Apple Studios.
Speaker 4 (06:14):
I have no idea.
Speaker 1 (06:15):
So yes, my prediction is the robot will enter the
room and yours this Tim Apple will exit the room.
Speaker 4 (06:20):
That's right, Okay, perfect.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
One tech CEO. I don't think it's going anywhere, is Jensen.
Speaker 4 (06:26):
He's not going back to Dennis.
Speaker 1 (06:27):
He's not going back to Denny's.
Speaker 4 (06:29):
I wonder if he passes Denny's and he's like, I can't.
Speaker 1 (06:32):
No, I'm sure.
Speaker 2 (06:32):
I feel like it's a big part of his mythology.
He was at the Consumer Electronics Show this week, of
coursees delivering a keynote, and I count with my twenty
twenty six prediction before I read his remarks, which is
probably quite dumb, but because he is remarked, luckily we're
in line with my twenty twenty six prediction. He said
this will be the year when there's a chet GPT
(06:54):
moment for physical AI. This is not a disinterested statement.
Because Nvidio also announced they're getting into the self driving
car business.
Speaker 1 (07:01):
Yes, I saw that, and this is.
Speaker 2 (07:03):
Pretty interesting because previously you had Tesla sales falling Waymo
as the dominant players in US self driving robotaxis, and
it seemed like a two horse race. But part of
in Vidia's announcement was a partnership with Mercedes where they're
basically going to plug their software into other car makers.
Speaker 4 (07:23):
They're in the car business.
Speaker 2 (07:24):
They're not in the car business, but they're all of
a sudden kind of a competitor to their clients, right,
which is really interesting.
Speaker 4 (07:30):
That is very interesting. Do you think it's something that's
going to work.
Speaker 1 (07:34):
I wouldn't.
Speaker 2 (07:35):
I mean you you're you're the Innvidia shareholder that's against
your dear leader.
Speaker 1 (07:39):
No, No, I wouldn't.
Speaker 3 (07:40):
And I think it's very smart to not actually be
in the car design business. I think it's very smart
to like put your software in a pre existing car.
Speaker 2 (07:47):
Probably if you're if you're Mercedes who are doing the partnership,
or other auto makers, you're like, oh, this like a hail.
Mary's well, I think we have a chance of plugging
this in and catching up, which is which is really
really interesting. But he wasn't just talking about this self
driving car partnership. He was pointing at this kind of
robotic revolution. He likes hanging out with robots. We talked
about Earli last year. Remember he got the high five
from the humanoid robot.
Speaker 4 (08:08):
On his trip I Do, I Do?
Speaker 2 (08:11):
And another king of the self driving car world, Elon
himself is kind of seemingly more interested in.
Speaker 1 (08:17):
Humanoid robots than self driving cars. Now he's moved on,
he's moved on.
Speaker 2 (08:21):
He's definitely this time last year, optimist robot was hanging
out with Kim, and it seemed last year like a
pure gimmick. And now twelve months later there's a big
Wall Street Journal story saying that Elon is pivoting the
whole business to be human optimist robots.
Speaker 1 (08:34):
So it is interesting as this year I'd like to
meet Kim. This year we'll see.
Speaker 2 (08:40):
So humanoid robots stole the show at CS this year.
Speaker 1 (08:44):
Did you see any of the videos?
Speaker 4 (08:45):
Yes?
Speaker 1 (08:46):
What did you? What did you see?
Speaker 4 (08:48):
I think it was? Was it Tesla that I saw?
Speaker 1 (08:50):
You? Mintioned Tesla. I'm going to show you Boston Dynamics.
Speaker 3 (08:53):
Dynamics, Yes, show me the spot the dog famously they did.
Speaker 1 (08:57):
They've now got Atlas, the person a.
Speaker 4 (09:00):
Booty hun her.
Speaker 1 (09:01):
What are you seeing?
Speaker 4 (09:02):
So I'm seeing the biggest nerd on the planet.
Speaker 3 (09:05):
It kind of reminds me of Elizabeth Holmes when something
good happens with Faranos coming out and doing like one
of those like kick dancers.
Speaker 2 (09:13):
It's an extremely flexible humanoid robot doing cotwheels, doing Russian
Cossack dancing.
Speaker 1 (09:19):
That is what it is, russian'd.
Speaker 4 (09:21):
Yeah, it's incredible that they've trained them to do this.
Speaker 2 (09:24):
It is And so Hyundai, who actually bought Boston Dynamics
lost this robot Atlas.
Speaker 1 (09:31):
It can lift up to one hundred and ten pounds.
Speaker 2 (09:33):
It can work in temperatures between minus four degrees fahrenheit
up to one hundred and four degrees.
Speaker 4 (09:38):
Assud of the problem of needing cooling centers.
Speaker 1 (09:40):
You don't and actually the battery is pretty amazing as well.
Speaker 2 (09:42):
Last time, like when humanoid robots were last on sixty minutes,
had these huge hunchback of notre.
Speaker 1 (09:47):
Dam story packs, battery packs.
Speaker 2 (09:49):
But now it's just a pure human form essentially, which
is kind of interesting. They're planning to produce thirty thousand
of these robots per year, with the goal of them
working on factory flos by twenty twenty eight.
Speaker 4 (10:01):
They're like, humans can't work in hard enough environments. We
need to make robot.
Speaker 1 (10:05):
Well, I mean, I guess.
Speaker 4 (10:05):
It's a that's a good thing.
Speaker 1 (10:07):
It could be a good thing.
Speaker 2 (10:08):
I mean, I look, I don't know if these are
actually going to replace humans on the factory floor, but
certainly they've got everyone talking about Hyundai for the first
time in a while, I don't talk about human So
those are humanoid robots designed by Hyundai to be factory workers. LG,
another South Korean tech firm, also made waves of cs
(10:28):
this year with its robot called Cloyd Cloud. Lloyd claud
Lloyd Cloud exactly, which ladders up to a vision.
Speaker 1 (10:37):
Do you know what the vision is?
Speaker 4 (10:38):
What is the vision?
Speaker 1 (10:39):
The zero labor home that's I'm looking for.
Speaker 3 (10:42):
I was just thinking, if I have to do another
load of laundry, like it's Sissifian the cloud.
Speaker 1 (10:47):
Literally Cloyd literally does the laundry.
Speaker 4 (10:49):
Can I try this?
Speaker 1 (10:50):
Yeah, of course, Eliza.
Speaker 2 (10:53):
Cloyd can remove dishes from the dishwasher, what heat up
food in the oven? This is this is not a
domestic home now, this is domestic laborer.
Speaker 4 (11:01):
Oh my god.
Speaker 2 (11:02):
It can interact seamlessly with other LG devices like your
fridge and your cooker.
Speaker 3 (11:07):
So it is the connected home that then has the
robot that's running your connected.
Speaker 2 (11:10):
The robot is the is the conductor to the symphony
of your connected home.
Speaker 4 (11:15):
Not particularly opposed to this, I got to.
Speaker 2 (11:16):
Say these were of the only humanoid robots who took
CS by storm. There was also the switchbot one row
h one that can fill a coffee machine, make breakfast,
wash the windows. And then there's the one EX Neo robot.
This one is kind of interesting because it doesn't have
the best fine motor control, which I think is true
(11:38):
of all of these robots. So if you have a
one X Neo robot in your home, you have to
consent to the fact that it will sometimes switch into
a mode where it's being human controlled, so there will
be somebody looking through your robot into your home, wearing
some kind of like haptic suit, doing what the robot
(11:58):
needs to do.
Speaker 1 (12:00):
It's like Avatar.
Speaker 2 (12:01):
Can you imagine buying your robot and then having somebody
sitting four thousand miles away in your house, yes, doing
your domestic.
Speaker 4 (12:10):
Robots.
Speaker 2 (12:11):
The jobs created by robots are people working thousands of
miles away to operate robots in your home.
Speaker 1 (12:17):
It's a bizarre Also.
Speaker 2 (12:19):
Like I wouldn't really want camera in my home, which
is external.
Speaker 3 (12:24):
And we'll talk about this in my next story. But
there are also places where I don't want cameras.
Speaker 1 (12:27):
Yeah, I want to hear about that.
Speaker 2 (12:29):
Just before we turn away from CS, there was some
other robots which are pretty cool but not humanoid. Tell
me there's the anchor Uphie s two vacuum. It's rumba
with them up and it can travel between carpeted areas,
then go to the hard floor to mop it, come
back to the carpeted area. No water spilled, anything like that.
(12:51):
And Cara has an aromatherapy.
Speaker 4 (12:54):
Diffuser, Oh my god.
Speaker 2 (12:56):
And then finally smart fridges which can scan your empty
packages and add them to a shopping list for the
next grocery run. So it's a camera inside the fridge
that accesses an app while shopping, so.
Speaker 1 (13:09):
Kind of remind you either on nine or in the
real world. Yeah, or you need to buy it.
Speaker 3 (13:13):
I mean it is like on a macro level, pretty
incredible the way in which technology is like filling the
gaps and what humans can do, and also just like
taking care of time, Like all these things are very
time intensive. The question is is like is it time
that we want to eradicate, Like do we want to not.
Speaker 4 (13:29):
Go to the grocery store. What are we supposed to
be doing instead.
Speaker 1 (13:34):
Working on our computer?
Speaker 4 (13:36):
Exactly?
Speaker 2 (13:36):
That is the conundrum of the I have to work
all the time, so then when do I do things
which are non compensated labor but very important, like yeah,
the house up is that? That's like, yes, so I
never I never do the things that I need to
do which are not directly work related, Like I have
such a long list of annoying personal things.
Speaker 4 (13:54):
We call it personal ad personal admin.
Speaker 1 (13:56):
Yes, I never get through it. Yes, I don't know if,
but it doesn't tend to be still if the robot
could do not yet not yet.
Speaker 3 (14:02):
I mean I still think the idea of like, I
live in an apartment building where not only humans live,
but a humanoid robot lives.
Speaker 4 (14:08):
Like how far out are we on.
Speaker 2 (14:09):
That you will go to somebody's house this year, I bet,
and they'll have a robot.
Speaker 4 (14:13):
That's crazy. Okay, we'll see. I obviously did not get
to Cees this week. I did, though, get to Wegmans.
Speaker 1 (14:22):
The grocery store, yes, the grocery.
Speaker 3 (14:24):
Store, because I read this article in the Gothamis that
the grocery store chain was using facial recognition software in
their NYC location.
Speaker 1 (14:32):
Well wow, what did the goemists find out about this?
Speaker 3 (14:35):
So actually, a city law in twenty twenty one requires
stores to put up a sign if they use facial
recognition software, so Wegmans complied. The funny thing is I
went to Wegmans, and I really had to search for
this sign. And Wegmans might disagree with me because there
was a sign on the door, But the way in
(14:55):
which I had to look for it, because it was
like sliding in and out of view on the automatic door,
really made me laugh.
Speaker 2 (15:02):
So you went to Wegmans looking for the sign, you
hadn't been looking for the sign, you wouldn't have seen it.
Speaker 3 (15:07):
So there were people that I talked to and I
pointed out the sign to them when I went to
the store, and they were like, no, I.
Speaker 4 (15:13):
Didn't notice that.
Speaker 1 (15:13):
I didn't recognize that.
Speaker 4 (15:14):
I didn't see that.
Speaker 3 (15:15):
Because if you're not looking for it, I think we're
so used to just seeing signs up and if there
don't apply, Like, I've never looked at pet signs until recently.
Speaker 1 (15:23):
So you found the sign. What did it say?
Speaker 3 (15:25):
It said, quote biometric identifier information collected at this location. Then,
in much finer print, quote Wegman's Food Market, Inc. Collects, retains, converts, stores,
or shares customers biometric identifier information, which may include facial recognition,
(15:46):
eye scans, and voice prints.
Speaker 2 (15:48):
Of those two verbs, converts and shares stand out to
me as convert, I'm like converts into what shares with whom?
Speaker 3 (15:55):
So Gofmus actually asked Wegmans about how they were storing
the data, how long they were storing it for, and
how the company would share this data with law enforcement.
Speaker 4 (16:05):
Surprise surprise, Wegmans did.
Speaker 2 (16:07):
Not reply, Okay, what you've been been bearing the leave
for a while. Now.
Speaker 1 (16:12):
What this is is this? What is this is a
customer retention to safety thing safety.
Speaker 3 (16:17):
Yes, so the sign says, quote, we use facial recognition
technology to protect the safety and security of our patrons
and employees and do not lease, trade, or otherwise profit
from the transfer of biometric identify or information.
Speaker 2 (16:34):
It is interesting because like in New York they now
have like you know these like plastic.
Speaker 4 (16:39):
Covers on everything in CBS.
Speaker 1 (16:41):
So that you can't sell the people shoplift.
Speaker 4 (16:43):
I mean, this is just replacing the old Have you seen.
Speaker 1 (16:46):
This person right now?
Speaker 4 (16:48):
You know what I mean?
Speaker 3 (16:48):
Like, you go into any bodega or any sort of
like smoke shop and there's been a shoplifter and they
have a photo from the camera that is so blurry
that you can't even see if this person is a person. Now,
what we have is a company that has a lot
of money to invest in software and basically they can
capture any face and cross reference that face if that
(17:10):
face has been known to shoplift.
Speaker 2 (17:12):
Yeah, but it's also like if you haven't been shoplifting.
Like the idea that you can be personally identified every
time you go into a shop and cross reference to
older weird.
Speaker 1 (17:22):
It's like, you know, you didn't leave your wallet in
the shop.
Speaker 2 (17:25):
You left your whole identity there that's right to be shared, converted,
and whatever else that will.
Speaker 3 (17:30):
It's just a very strange phenomenon. So I actually talked
to a few people, and luckily I had a very
intelligent woman who had seen the same Gothmass article I had.
I approached her and said to her, you, did you
know that facial recognition technology was being used at this Wegman?
She said, I knew it was being used at Wegmans.
I thought it was at the Wegmans in Brooklyn, and
(17:50):
that she actually hadn't clocked the side in the Manhattan store.
The only reason she knew about it was because she
had read the Gothmist article.
Speaker 1 (17:56):
I want to hear the tape.
Speaker 3 (17:58):
Do you feel comfortable with your biometrics oatomy collected by
a large grocery stoarch?
Speaker 5 (18:01):
I know, I actually had the thought right as I
walked in here. I was like, maybe I should put
my little scarf around my field wearing.
Speaker 4 (18:07):
A really cute scarf right now.
Speaker 5 (18:08):
Maybe you should use it or like a giant pair
of sunglasses. Yeah no, I mean, I guess the way
I feel about it is like I'm not sure that
it is going to impact me personally. In any real way.
But I think there are certain people for whom it's
really bad. Yeah, you know, I'm like a white lady who.
Speaker 1 (18:26):
Is like.
Speaker 5 (18:28):
Economically mobile, and so I'm sort of like not worried
about it for myself, which I guess is why I
still came in here. But on principle, yeah, I think
it's bad.
Speaker 3 (18:39):
You know, it's actually interesting she was wearing this kind
of cravat that was this little cashmir brown scarf, and
her idea to cover her face with a scarf is
actually a good one. Four or four recently published an
article about anti surveillance design, which you and I have
talked about, remember in terms of three M and the
Hong Kong protests.
Speaker 1 (18:57):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (18:57):
Four. A fourth point is like, facial recognition tech is complicated,
but actually tricking it is very easy and the most
effective tool you can use to trick facial recognition technology
is actually a mask.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
Is Wegman's an outlier here or the other? I mean
this you big quich is?
Speaker 2 (19:10):
I know, for example, when you go to the airport,
you can sometimes shop with your.
Speaker 4 (19:14):
First like the f out Actually no, it's not just Wegmans.
Speaker 3 (19:18):
There are stores of Albertson's Walmart, Kroger's are all using
it in some of their locations.
Speaker 4 (19:23):
I think also Home Depot, Low's, Macy's. I mean, I
think a lot of people won't care.
Speaker 3 (19:29):
Yeah, and a lot of people will just say, I've
been surveilled. What is this, as we used to say,
a little sprinkle of lder going to do to my
day to day? If I'm not someone who should be
worried about shoplifting, And to that, I say, what if
it's not forever about shoplifting?
Speaker 4 (19:44):
Right after the break, the P.
Speaker 3 (19:51):
And GLP ones are having a moment and only fans
models are getting very special US visas.
Speaker 1 (19:57):
Stay with us and we're back. Does the word peptide
mean anything to you?
Speaker 3 (20:08):
My friends are always like the peptides, the peptides and my
skincare and the peptide what I think they use skincare
that have like peptides that titans their face.
Speaker 1 (20:17):
Have they been to peptide raves apps?
Speaker 3 (20:19):
I mean, unless you're talking about the their bathroom now.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
Well.
Speaker 2 (20:24):
The New York Times had a great story this week
with the headline Chinese peptides are the latest biohacking trend
in the tech world. It had one source saying quote
the elites all have a Chinese peptide dealer, and it
follows several Silicon Valley workers, all between twenty and forty
who are buying unregulated peptides from China with the hope
(20:45):
that it will improve their health, their sleep, their fitness,
and their focus.
Speaker 1 (20:49):
But what is it?
Speaker 4 (20:50):
I mean? I know peptides are like protein.
Speaker 2 (20:53):
What is Peptides are amino acids that regulate hormones in
the body and reduce in flammation, which is why it's
a popular ingredient I learned in skin care products. It's
also and I didn't know this embarrassingly, the P in
GLP one.
Speaker 3 (21:09):
I didn't know that just until this very moment. So
the p peptides improve health.
Speaker 4 (21:15):
They're good. People like them, But why do they like them? Like,
what do people say that they do?
Speaker 2 (21:20):
People are claiming that different types of peptides work for
different types of ailments.
Speaker 1 (21:26):
Peptides is like.
Speaker 2 (21:27):
A catsual term for these collections of amino acids, and
people are using all kinds of different peptides for different purposes.
So people say that these peptides can stimulate wound healing
with by stimulating new blood vessel growth, better sleep, of course,
weight loss, increase focus. One of the weirdest things was
improving eye contact. Quote from the story, One Open AI
(21:50):
researcher called it a zepic for autism. There have been
some negative side effects. One woman in the New York
Times story had all her hair fall out bad Two
women will hostpit life with swollen tongues and racing hearts
after shooting up on peptides at an anti aging festival
in Vegas.
Speaker 4 (22:07):
Just like the worst case scenario use.
Speaker 1 (22:09):
Well, in the worst case scenario is probably you die.
Speaker 3 (22:12):
Right, So I'm just saying like in terms of like
people who are using glps are not generally like going
to shoot them up festivals.
Speaker 2 (22:20):
Well, that's what this is about. These raves are like
basically people are going to these parties with DJs where
all of these peptides, a DJ and a peptide, all
of these peptides are available, and somebody else is teaching
you how to make your own peptide cocktail. The time
(22:41):
that you went through a few of these raves, and
there are pictures of the raves in the article. People
are like have a needle in their arm with tape
with like a disco background.
Speaker 4 (22:51):
Oh so they can just like get fed, get fed peptides.
Speaker 1 (22:54):
Yeah yeah, Is this legal. It's kind of in a
gray area.
Speaker 2 (22:58):
Personal use is legal, and buying directly from suppliers is legal,
but very few peptides are FDA approved, and so biohackers
are very much injecting at their own risk. As the
woman whose hair fell out may testify. What's kind of
interesting is this is not as niche as you might imagine.
Speaker 4 (23:19):
The rave piece isn't the rave piece.
Speaker 1 (23:21):
Is pretty niche.
Speaker 2 (23:21):
In fact, you look at the photos in the New
York Times, it's like only a New York Times journalist
could describe that as.
Speaker 1 (23:25):
A rave It's like four people in a room with
purple light.
Speaker 4 (23:29):
Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah yeah yeah.
Speaker 2 (23:31):
But as a party, I guess at best, imports of
peptides and hormones from China doubled.
Speaker 4 (23:38):
I was going to ask why China, and then I
was like, I know the yes they make.
Speaker 2 (23:41):
So in twenty twenty four, there were one hundred and
sixty four million dollars worth of Chinese peptides imported to
the US in the first three quarters of the year.
In twenty twenty five, three hundred and twenty eight million
exactly double, which is three twenty million dollars of Chinese peptides.
Speaker 4 (23:59):
Which makes you one, does it work or is there
just hype?
Speaker 1 (24:03):
I mean JLP's work.
Speaker 4 (24:04):
Have you ever had an I.
Speaker 2 (24:07):
Listen, Honestly reading the article, I was like, Wow, if
I had a lot more time on my hands and
I was a little bit more crazed, I can easily
imagine going down this rabbit hole.
Speaker 3 (24:18):
Yeah here all you kind of can, though, just with
like very cursory use of GLP wan like a lot
of people, I mean basically everybody.
Speaker 1 (24:26):
I know. Yeah, I'm also exploring. You're exploring I.
Speaker 4 (24:29):
Am exploring wait no, for mental health benefits.
Speaker 2 (24:32):
So that was one of the things mentioned in the article,
microdosing GLPS for mental health. But you know, it's like
the promise that rather than like going to the gym
four times a week and meditating for forty five minutes
a day and going on a walk and looking at the.
Speaker 3 (24:47):
Sky back to your it goes back to what you're saying,
which is this list of all the stuff that you
have to do when you're not working is really hard
to do, Like, can I achieve it with this coat that.
Speaker 1 (24:59):
I can buy on line? Yes, so it's tempting.
Speaker 2 (25:01):
I actually, luckily I don't have enough time to go
down the rabbit hole, but I but I can imagine.
Speaker 1 (25:06):
I can imagine maybe you could have a robot that
could stranger things.
Speaker 4 (25:09):
Stranger things.
Speaker 3 (25:10):
Absolutely, I want to pivot. But do you consider yourself
an exceptional creative?
Speaker 1 (25:18):
Have you been reading my LinkedIn again?
Speaker 3 (25:20):
I've been reading your thoughts because I take Pepta and
I read this article that said influencers and only fans
models dominate the US extraordinary artist visa, and I thought
of you.
Speaker 1 (25:31):
I saw that story. I didn't read it, but I'm
glad to bring it up.
Speaker 4 (25:34):
And you know why I thought of you.
Speaker 1 (25:35):
Because I had one visa.
Speaker 4 (25:37):
It was not because you were selling feed picks.
Speaker 2 (25:39):
I was reached for a time deemed by the US
government an extraordinary artist.
Speaker 4 (25:44):
So do you know where this this I learned for
the first time reporting the story. Do you know where
it came from? The one visa came from no idea.
Speaker 3 (25:51):
So these visas were created because in the nineteen seventies,
the Nixon administration was trying to deport John Lennon put
over his politics. But Lenin was able to stay in
the US because he was deemed an outstanding person in
the arts and science.
Speaker 1 (26:06):
So you and John Lennon, Wow, and now a lot
of only fans.
Speaker 4 (26:10):
Creators and boy George and Shinnan O'Connor wow. Yes.
Speaker 3 (26:14):
The FT reports that currently an overwhelming number of people
getting approved for OH one visas are influencers and OnlyFans models.
One lawyer who was interviewed called them scroll kings and
I love, I.
Speaker 4 (26:27):
Really love scroll kings and queens.
Speaker 3 (26:30):
The number of scroll kings and queens has actually, like
peptide use, doubled since twenty ten.
Speaker 2 (26:37):
Wow, and why is applicants looked upon so favorably by
the case officers at the United States Citizenship and Immigration
Services Bureau.
Speaker 3 (26:46):
Some immigration lawyers said that follower account makes a difference.
The visa process is complicated and requires a lot of paperwork.
Speaker 2 (26:53):
No, been true, But that's interesting at the follow account
because much like with the large iguage models, where if
it doesn't exist in writing, doesn't exist. Yeah, in your
one visa application, it doesn't exist if you can't measure
it well. You need to come up with all of
these very concrete numbers to demonstrate reach and influence and
blah blah, blah so and who.
Speaker 3 (27:14):
Can demonstrate reach and influence better than an influencer or
someone with an only fans account, no one, you know.
I think there are other people who have these visas
who might be able to say, Okay, I'm in a
major film or I'm in theater productions, you know, and
get recommendations from experts in their field. These only fans
models and influencers are like, look, I have twenty million followers,
(27:35):
let me stay in the country.
Speaker 1 (27:37):
And how many exceptional talent visas are given out each year?
Speaker 4 (27:41):
Are you fishing?
Speaker 3 (27:45):
Only twenty thousand visas were granted in twenty twenty four,
and the majority of visas are still h one b's yeah,
your exception. That's it for this week for tech stuff,
(28:06):
I'm Karra Price.
Speaker 1 (28:06):
And I'm os Vloschin.
Speaker 2 (28:07):
This episode was produced by Eliza Dennis and Melissa Slaughter.
It was executive produced by me Caarra Price, Julian Nutta,
and Kate Osborne for Kaleidoscope and Katrina.
Speaker 1 (28:17):
Novelle for iHeart Podcasts.
Speaker 2 (28:19):
The engineer is Mike Coscarelli and Jack Insley mikes this episode.
Speaker 1 (28:23):
Kyle Murdoch wrote our theme.
Speaker 3 (28:25):
Song, Please rate, review and Reach out to us at
tech Stuff Podcast at.
Speaker 4 (28:29):
Gmail dot com. We want to hear from.
Speaker 3 (28:31):
You'll
TechStuff News
Hosts And Creators
Oz Woloshyn
Karah Preiss
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