Off Air... with Jane and Fi - Hot under the collar over some ribbed cranberry sauce (with Chris McCausland)

Episode Date: December 18, 2025

It’s the final official podcast episode of the year! Merry Christmas from all the Off Air team. Pour yourself a glass of fizz and settle in as Fi chats Swiss hot tubs, ribbed cranberry sauce, and a truly uncomfortable Ken Follett colander. Plus, comedian Chris McCausland discusses his documentary ‘Seeing into the Future’, about the future of technology and what it might hold for him personally. Chris' book is called 'Keep Laughing': https://www.waterstones.com/book/keep-laughing/chris-mccausland/9780241777367 Our most asked about book is called 'The Later Years' by Peter Thornton. You can listen to our 'I'm in the cupboard on Christmas' playlist here: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/1awQioX5y4fxhTAK8ZPhwQIf you want to contact the show to ask a question and get involved in the conversation then please email us: [e-mail] us on Instagram! @janeandfiPodcast Producers: Eve SalusburyExecutive Producer: Rosie Cutler Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Testing, testing, 1, 2, 3, 4, testing, testing. I think we're tested. Yes, that's what you are, yes. In many ways. Yes, we've been tested. We've been tested. And we're coming to the end of our Christmas run.

So this is the last podcast before Christmas, and we will end the podcast by sending you all Merry Christmas. greetings and stuff like that. We've got normal business to get through before the happy festive Santa sign off. Just in parish notices, I left my reading glasses at St. Bride's Church on Fleet Street last night. I know that the Reverend Alison Joyce is a listener to this podcast. If we could arrange a way of getting them back to me, that would be great. I'm going to give you a call later. Please don't be too spooked by it. St. Bride's Church in Fleet Street is the journalist church and it's really really beautiful and if you're ever in london and you've got a spare

half now you find yourself in that neck of the woods it's worth popping in if it's open it has an amazing atmosphere it's acoustically it just really works it's neither too big or too small and in terms of the work that it does it celebrates and commemorates all of the lives of journalists and at the moment there are just far too many journalists around the world who can't do their job. There are too many journalists who've been killed, particularly trying to cover the war in Gaza and Ukraine and Russia. And it's just a really moving thing, actually, when you sit down and think about it. These are people who haven't signed up to be part of any military campaign. They're trying to tell the truth about what's happening in the world, and it has become increasingly

difficult. Thereby ends the sad part. I just want to celebrate as well. AdFam. So I was there because it was the AdFam Christmas Carol Service. AdFam is a wonderful charity. It helps families who've got somebody struggling with addiction and it really, really works well for those people and they have this incredible carol service where quite a few of the people who take part in their creative voices competition throughout the year, which is a chance for people to tell their stories through poetry or prose. There's a competition and the entries are read out and the prizes are awarded and there was just so much love and joy in the church. And then the choir,

O-M-G, the choir is just sensational. They can just take you on this journey. And there was a lovely, lovely young woman who I bumped into in the ladies, and I'm sorry that I didn't ask your name because you did one of the solos in walking in the air at the end and there just wasn't a dry eye in the house.

So if you ever get a chance to go to the Advam Carol service, it's a worthy cause and it's a beautiful thing. I'm quite tired today. that's all I'll say and I left my glasses though it's such a stupid thing to do right

shall we start Eve with the rest of Hetty's ad phone calendar yes yes yes so we're going to have to do a bit of bunching up okay because we've got a lot to get through

we've got quite a few dates so maybe we should just do a couple okay at random right could you pick some randoms then please oh 17th that was yesterday give someone a compliment fee i like your top

oh that's very kind thank you very much I've had it for years that's a nice thing to say can we just say in terms of compliments actually so many people our listeners have really really enjoyed hearing you on the podcast

and I've enjoyed doing the podcast with you these last kind of 10 days or so enormously and I know that you're very happy behind the scenes you're very happy to be a producer but I think if you ever thought about stepping out in the morphorical dance troupe way

in front of the microphone I think people would want to hear more from you Eve that's all I'm very kind of you fee I had actually prepared a similar speech for you because I've got an email here from Susan titled fee you're playing a blinder and it just says sorry this is a bit of a sicky moment it is isn't it? Sicky burps all round everybody

don't worry we'll be rude to each other at a minute normal service reviews says I just wanted to say what a brilliant job you're doing for to be heading it up without Jane at the busiest time of year is a big thing and she wishes everyone a merry Christmas

and particularly you are well-deserved break and I knew you would not read that email out yourself but I want to say I agree with Susan I'm sorry but I'm still not going on a second date but no it's been so fun

no I've really enjoyed it too and thanks to everybody on the team actually so that's Hannah and Rosie as well and Jane and I are in very regular contact and she's going to stay up in Crosby and she's going to stay with her family for Christmas and as all of you have gathered by now her mum is just extremely unwell so she is in the place that she needs to be and do you know what props to times radio actually for being understanding and we've got a boss who just says well that's life

and that's the important part so of course you've got to go and do that and and I really think it's worth celebrating that because so many people don't find employers who are decent about compassionate leave and you can never get those times back you know it's just where you need to be so happy days around that was he only said one compliment but we've given out quite a few we have can you chunt us

that's chuntas three 23rd is a scratch guard oh my goodness do you want to do it because I'm a bit hung over and sometimes I find a scratch god's a bit overwhelmed I don't understand the rules just today what happens if we win we go to the Bahamas

okay it's a 10,000 pound top prize I'm scratching off the Christmas puddings I don't advocate gambling at this time of year because it leads to harm so this is just a one-off right so far I've got a 200 I've got a 20 I've got a 10

I've got a 1 and a 4 I'm lost I'll tell you what if anybody is put off by fingernails on a blackboard then you're just going to not be no I didn't get a single thing Hetty was a lovely idea but in a way I'm glad we hadn't won

because that would have been all kinds of trouble if we've won 10 grand right another one Or did we, and you just haven't sent them. Yeah, okay, so your compliments are skin-deep, aren't they? Let's do one more. The 18th today, there is £5 taped in here, buy a box of quality treats for the team,

which is so generous again, but fees really bought in a bottle of fizz and some mince pies, so we'll give it to charity. Yeah, that's very kind. That's very kind. Heddy, you must have taken such a long time to make all of these things, and decorate the Advent calendar and we are enormously grateful

it's provided us with a huge amount of amusement so many thanks for that I'm going to move on to Swiss humour legs spread apart oh please do and heated fountains dear Fee and Jane and team following on from Thursday's mention

of the Swiss Advent tradition of Gratti Ma or Gratjibance I took off the accents are you sure do you be fortunate enough to come to Zurich not Basel Yes, it is the unspoken truth. There are strong opinions with regards to which Swiss stylex deserve sympathy.

I have fun childhood memories of making sweet yeast dough figures of St. Nicholas, and it must have its legs spread wide open. You may be interested to know there's no such thing as a Gratty Frow, a woman, as it was firmly agreed that it would be unbecoming for a female figure to be depicted with legs spread open. Well, too blooming right. In Basel, there are a few jokes linked to this, not all suitable for broadcasting but one is

why are his legs wide open he's waiting for the tram to finally arrive it's bizarre and as our correspondent Nick says perhaps it's best to leave Swiss humour at that I think it is but this is a very interesting addition one more recent winter tradition

which I thought few would particularly appreciate is the increasing use of our fountains in winter small groups quietly light them up with candles and turn them into heated bars, hot tubs if you like, using very basic mobile wooden stoves. The latest fountain conversion, usually only lasts one evening, is announced quietly for those on specific WhatsApp groups and photography is generally discouraged. They are to be enjoyed, not socially media advertised, which adds to their magic. Last night as I was walking home through town, I stumbled across the latest one being prepared. I can't but feel.

feel that despite what the Swiss lack in humour, we have much that would bring light to others during the dark months. That sounds amazing. Well, it's really amazing. And there is this photograph of, you know, just the central square with, you know, one of those great big, lakey things in the middle. Well, it's where the fountains are. I see.

And it's got candles in jam jars all around it. So what's the kind of climate like in Switzerland at this time of year? Very, very cold. Very, very cold. So how lovely just to slip into a warm fountain. Yeah, no, I think that's just fantastic. We have a bit of a lack of fountains here in London, I'd say. We've got the ones in Trafalgar Square, haven't we, with the lions?

But you're right, we don't really do, we don't do huge fountains, do we? But then we've got a river running through us. So do you think that's... Well, we do it, although it's looking a bit miserable today. So great, but that is true. So I guess we're probably... We probably shouldn't ask too many more questions about that if it's a slightly secret squirrel thing.

It sounds a bit magic, and we should respect that. magic. Yeah, and how lovely to have something that is not being endlessly Instagramed. And what a nice thing to just stumble upon and know that that's going on and just leave them to it. Yeah, really lovely. So we'll forgive the jokes. I'm never going to understand that one. No, no.

It just sounds painful. It would be painful. Pronunciation pronunciation comes in from Chrissy D. Your little chat about your colleague talking about Pringlays has triggered my massive bee in my bonnet about the universal mispronunciation of the letter 8. Over recent years, there's been an explosion of people saying H to describe the letter

H, which the dictionary says is simply pronounced H. Now, Amal Rajan's in trouble with Chrissy D because he is a frequent user of H on university challenge of all places, as Chrissy D says. Can you assist my MAGA campaign make H great again by broadcasting this on your podcast? I've never heard you or Jane transgress on this, but then you're both Proper journalists and broadcasters. Thank you for that. Have a lovely Christmas.

Best wishes, Grizzie D. Yeah, I don't really understand that. I don't. So I... Is someone making a noise? Sorry. No, I've got to be in my bonnet. My mum was always quite strict on telling me to say H.

But my childhood best friend, her mum was American. And then she, so she would always say H. Yeah. So is it an Americanisation? It may well be. Not too sure. But it doesn't really bug me. I don't really know.

No, I don't get too... I don't get too bugged out about it. And I know that we've got a correspondent, Patricia, who gets so upset. Whether, either Jane or... I'm going to say this deliberately to annoy Patricia, whenever Jane or me says Jane or I. Because one of those is wrong, is it? Yes, and I'm not sure which.

No, and... Sorry, I'm going to go and tell that man to turn his volume down. Man, turn your volume down. I'm watching this scene from afar because we've got a glass screen in between the studios and Eve is marching in and she's saying

very firmly but politely to a young man who's making trails that he needs to stop making trails so loudly he's now staring at me with a what's your problem look on his face? It wasn't even him fair enough he said a smile back

sorry can you turn it down so where's the noise coming from? I think it's Santa in our pipes. Is it? Okay. Father Christmas. This one is also about mispronunciation. It comes in from Beck. You asked about mispronounce words.

My favourite was from a very lovely, very posh girl I used to have a Saturday job within my youth. She referred her Yamaha clarinet as a Yamaha, which is rubbish, isn't it? It is particularly quite posh people that Yeah, they do quite fun mispronciations of things. So in my family for a while, and my family aren't very, very posh at all,

but my mum has always really loved certain very specific things, Latin being one of them, Eve. Take of that what you are. And for a long time in our youth, she did refer to the picture house, where you go and see the movies, as the Kinema. Is that where it comes from?

And do you remember you said that's another story in a cell? And I said, I'm going to make you tell me that, and you have. And the thing is, it's just, but the thing is, nobody knows how Latin was pronounced. You know, nobody's got a tape, have they, of Caesar, marching around saying, I want to watch a movie in the Canemar. The thing is, is that it lives on in you because you say it. I do say it. And it's just, I don't know where it came from.

And it's one of those secrets that's just going to, it's going to, to leave the earth with my mother she's never going to never going to tell me why it's going to live on with us let's all start saying the kinema christmas presents comes in from julia and it is a lovely lovely question and actually we could run this over christmas and pick it up the other side because she says what do you think might be the worst christmas present anybody could possibly unwrap on christmas morning and this is because and this is a bit this is a bit weird this one. I belong to a group run by the nutritionist Patrick Holford, whose main area of expertise is the protection of the brain through diet against Alzheimer's. I joined as my own mother

suffered from this and I'm keen to protect my own brain if I can. In his latest newsletter, he's advertising Alzheimer's testing kits, essentially blood tests as ideal Christmas presents for loved ones. But can you imagine being the recipient of one of these amidst the joyful hurley-burly of Christmas Day. It gets my vote as the worst present idea ever. Kind regards and a Merry Christmas. Well, I'm with you, Julia. I mean, the thing is, it's a really useful gift

to give to somebody, isn't it? If they do want to know. It's not really a gift, is it? No, does that count as a gift? You're absolutely right. It's a useful thing to give to somebody. But also, if they need it or want it, I mean, I'm absolutely with you.

If you unwrap that on Christmas Day in front of the tree with the grandkiddies all running around. Do you know, I was reading a book the other day, a novel where there's a tiny bit of a storyline about a DNA testing kit being given as a gift and then, you know, what that actually means because the person in the book is adopted, so it's given by her children to her.

And she says, actually, that's not a present. That's a really onerous task that I'm now, meant to participate in because somebody else's curiosity is greater than my own yeah do you remember I think it's last year someone wrote in to say that they got a journal thing that had prompts about delving into their childhood and all these kind of big deep and it's supposed to be a nice kind of like collate your memories and leave this for the next generation and I remember the emailed in and just said this is just a lot to sit and reflect on that kind of thing almost every day and I think you're right. I think you've got to be very careful

what you are asking of other people at Christmas. And the Alzheimer's Testing Kit, I'm really with you on that, Alison. I'm just looking at, I want to get the title of the book right, because it was recommended to us. To Thornton one? Oh, no, no, no. But yes, could you do parish notices on that?

Because I think actually we should just start every other podcast. I was going to say, we're a bit all over the place. I was actually going to say that we should put that in the description. It's the most requested thing ever. someone has emailed in asking the title of the book by Peter Thornton. It's called The Later Years and it's about getting your affairs in order before you die. Peter Thornton, The Later Years, and maybe I will start putting it in the description because everyone always asks.

They do. It's worth buying. The book that I'm referring to is Virginia Evans, The Correspondent, which is the most extraordinary book, which is just written as a novel, but it's emails and letters. Is that the one Laura Hackett? Hard, hard, hard, hard, recommends. Yeah, and it is incredible. I can only read it in quite tiny chunks because it's quite challenging

to have to them put together, you know, without any narrative, descriptive passages, the links between all of these people who are emailing and writing to each other, but it's so clever and it is very funny. And it's little things like that that are dropped in along the way

that make you realise there's going to be much more of a twisty-turny plot coming up. So that, I would recommend. recommend it so far. I'm only about halfway through. People may be left wondering with an air of mystery hanging over them whether or not the cranberry sauce serving suggestion is a universally acknowledged thing and we've got photographic evidence of it now coming in from Robin who joins us from Maine. It is very true that a can of cranberry sauce, aka cranberry jelly, simply must be included as part of the Thanksgiving feast. I remember my grandparents liked it and I never tried

it. Gosh darn it. I mean, that's just, he's so American, isn't he? I've never actually tried it, but gosh darn it. I'm going to do that in an American accent for you, rather. I've never actually tried it, but gosh darn it. It simply isn't Thanksgiving without it. Never want to miss an opportunity for an accident. And that was a particularly bad one. Here it is in his glory. I'm glad you said it. He's shake it out of its can and you lay it down on its side on a plate and those who enjoy cranby sauce. will help themselves by slicing off a sliver. And there it is. There it is in its little tin canny style. It's all... It's all... Ribbed down the side.

Don't get too excited, gentlemen. Niche Christmas present comes in from Patricia. Well done, ladies, for valiantly keeping the ball rolling with off air. Keep going, keep going, keep going, keep going, Eve. But what was I hearing? A Ken Follett Collander as a Christmas present for Jane in my waking listening. This took a few moments to process as I imagine

the horror of draining the boiling pastro over Ken's face! Oh, we cannot leave the listener with that visual image. Thankfully, it didn't take too long to acknowledge my misheard understanding and move on to the image of a gorgeous calendar for Jane to gaze at over her morning coffee. I have already looked for one and there isn't one. I mean, you can commission, so if I really wanted to, I could commission a calendar of Ken Follett's,

but I'm not going to do that because it feels weird. Perhaps the Murdoch budget may allow. Do you think the Murdochard budget may allow? In these trying times, it may allow, it may allow. I'll look into that. Yeah, but also there's definitely no Ken Follett Bath towel. And I don't know why that is. I think he's as universally appealing as Paul Meskell.

I think you're quite right, and I think you're onto something. Dinner for One in the cupboard, this comes in from Pamela. I watched Dinner for One in Germany many years ago. I could never understand why it isn't shown over here. It featured Freddie Frinton from the Bootsie and Snudge sitcom. That's one for the senior listeners. That is completely over my head. I've never heard of Bootsie and Snudge.

Frustratingly, despite various creative searches, I can't find the podcast playlist either. I'm living in the cupboard at Christmas. I'd appreciate direction. In the description, we currently still have the dancing in your house alone playlist linked. I'll update it and add the new playlist. You can very easily find it on Spotify, though. if you type in

if you type in off air with Jane and Fee I'm in the cupboard at Christmas you just have to make sure that you're... There's not many other things called that. Nothing else comes up. Naut else comes up.

But obviously you have to make sure that you're in playlists not in podcasts because otherwise it'll just give you all the podcasts. I'm addicted to this playlist I think it is our best one yet because to go from upside down

Diana Ross into Joni Mitchell's River into your choice Jack Johnson Banana Pancakes starting it all off with the rubber band man from the spinners which is just a superb track and the Peter Galada song I played it to the kids last night

as we were going to the carol service and they just couldn't believe it because nobody's writing lyrics like that anymore if you don't like yoga if you have half a brain is one of the rhyming couplets yeah it's just fantastic so it's very very good

and it ends with Good Luck Babe by Chapel Rhone Yeah, good to have Chappell Row. It's as much of a journey as Christmas Day is. Yeah, it really is. It's absolutely blooming lovely. So thank you for that. We hope it does keep your company in the cupboard at Christmas. And we will do more of these little podcast playlists with funny titles in the new year.

We have got an absolutely delightful interview for you now. And I would really, really recommend staying with it, even if you don't normally listen to the interviews. And I know that some of you don't. but this one is with Chris McCausland and it's about technology and both Eve and I when we recorded it we came out of the interview

with a slightly different perspective on technology and AI to the one that we'd had before and that just doesn't often happen, does it? No. I think it's a perspective that I hadn't considered and that we can't fully understand so to hear Chris's approach to technology

which is so different to probably what we talk about every day and that we hear on the radio. It was very refreshing. And it was quite heartening in a way to hear someone so optimistic because I do think we get a bit bogged down in the doom and gloom of it all.

Yeah, no, I agree, I agree. And a couple of times when we've considered the subject, and actually particularly after the interview with Aline Van de Veldon about her AI creation, Tilly Norwood, you know, there will be a couple of emails and when we played that out on the live radio show from people who go, the Luddites are getting all of the attention and the noise is coming from a Luddite perspective at the moment.

And no matter what you think about the ethics and the morality of some points of AI, it is an opportunity for a new industry to be created. And so, of course, you know, we need to be very careful about that morality and the ethics, but we aren't able to stop what's going to happen from happening. But we are not powerless against it. Our choices and how we use AI, and this is what Chris McCausland touches on too, can be helpful in shaping AI. So we mustn't feel that we're completely and utterly already overridden and useless. Chris McCausland started to lose his sight

in his 20s. He knew he had the condition retinitis pigmentosa because it's hereditary. His grandmother, his mother and his sister all had it. He is now blind, which is why it was astonishing that he lifted the glitter ball trophy on Strictly Come Dancing, learning all of those steps through verbal description, physical guidance, and the clever use of metaphor from his partner, Diane Buswell. He's a sought-after comic, he's got his own series on Netflix

with the brilliant title, Speaky Blinder. He has a memoir out called Keep Laughing, and after he won strictly, he could take his pick of what to do next, and he told the BBC he wanted to explore the horizon of new technology and AI in a documentary called Seeing Into the Future. Chris has got a degree in software engineering and has always loved his tech. And the documentary makes us step out of the doom loop

where AI spells the end of the world as we know it. Although we might see some of the advances in AI as speeding up our world, but undermining human decision-making and therefore human relevance. To Chris, much of it simply means he can join a world we all take for granted. I think in order for us to have this,

conversation about what you found over in Silicon Valley and MIT, we need to know a little bit more about your own background because in fact you understand the world of technology and engineering, I think probably better than most, would that be fair to say? Yeah, well, I mean, specifically software engineering, which is not like proper engineering at all. It's a fancy name for programming. But I, you know, my degree is in software engineering and it was always the thing I was good at that I had an aptitude for and really I just took the path

of least resistance right the way through my education you know so computers and maths for what I was good at when I was a teenager so I did computers maths and further maths A level software engineering degree and I've been doing comedy for 22 years but I think once a geek always a geek yeah I think you're downplaying what's going on

in your brain there because it's not the path of least resistance to understand software engineering following wherever you're good at at every state Whatever you like every stage along the way is the path of least resistance of whatever you end up doing, in it, really? Well, I guess so. Can you tell us what you thought you'd find and the kind of the reason for making this documentary?

Well, the reason for, I mean, I actually pitched this documentary in 2019 and I pitched it at a time when AI wasn't really in the public conscience, but it was, you know, it was obviously a thing that was, that was, there was a lot of development and it was on the cusp of showing its face and the feedback I got was it would be interested in AI and so we kind of just put it on the shelf

and then COVID happened and then I made a travel show with the production company that we pitched this idea with and I then got very busy, did strictly and all of a sudden the BBC were like, have you got any ideas? I said, well funny enough I did have this idea six years ago

five or six years ago and I said about AI. Oh, that's interesting. Everybody's interested in AI. So it was from that perspective, but there's so much negative commentary about AI and some of it's justified, some of its fearmongering, some of its nonsense. And there's not a positive commentary going on. And so what I wanted to do is just kind of, on one hand, give a positive perspective on what AI can bring into people's lives. But also, AI is very much in the mainstream consciousness. And, you know, with regard to disability, it's always been niche bespoke technologies from specialist companies that have been what you've had to rely on if you've got a disability for access, very expensive, ugly pieces of

equipment specifically to satisfy the need of somebody with a disability. And over the last 15 years, it's very much become that mainstream technologies are becoming the new access technologies you know from smartphones even things like PlayStation's have got you know screen readers in which like allow the menus to be spoken out and things like that

so accessibility is being incorporated into mainstream technologies and what is exciting or on the cusp of everybody's future is also what is for people with disabilities as well it's almost like we're invited into the club for the first time rather than having a separate little room just for us and so it was about that really

what's on the horizon for everybody but also what will it do for me I thought one of the really clever things that you did in the documentary was we join you in your hotel bedroom and easy tigers this isn't going where you think it might be go completely different documentary that one

that amazed the BBC turned that one down for us we join you as you're just doing such a simple thing which is choosing what you want to wear of a morning and so for you trying to you know make sure that you're wearing the t-shirt that you want to wear is actually problematic unless you have technology or a person with you so you're using your mobile phone aren't you to do that and it can already tell you what's in your closet

so you just it's looking through the camera it's like having a person with you and if you don't point out that it's AI and people aren't aware of what AI is capable of they think I've got my wife on FaceTime or something like that because it's talking to me like there's a person looking through the camera on the phone and it's describing clothing whether it's

whether any dining whether it's you know whether it looks clean you know I even you know I show it an old band t-shirt from the deaf tones you know an old you know metal band and even comments oh what a nostalgic t-shirt it's a good thing it's it's nuts

when people see it in action and this is, you know, chat GPT came out three years ago really and it's already at the point where it's mind-blowing and, you know, this was just using chat GPT on its video setting through its iOS app on the iPhone, it's already bananas. It's the worst it's going to be. It's only going to get better at these things.

And so, yeah, it was to show people really what it is capable of and how it can change people's lives. One of the things, Chris, that people seem to be very fearful about is the way that large language learning models like chat GPT can appear to be your friend. And definitely for the younger generation, there have already been some horrendous examples of a human being actually thinking that what comes back at them is a person.

So are you making that very clear distinction in your mind right from the get-go? because in a way we could understand why needing to rely on something within a machine would make you feel more like you were kind of mates with it. Yeah, I mean, I don't really kind of... I'm not fearful that this is a problem that we haven't encountered before. We had the same problem with the internet.

You know, you're giving kids access to strangers, people who can pretend to be, you know, a teenage boy and they're really a 50-year-old man and you're allowing people to, kids to access, you know, parts of the internet and people from all parts of the world without their parents

really being able to keep tabs on their behavior and their actions. So the internet and technology is always throwing up these problems that we need to regulate or we need to solve. You know, my daughter's on Roblox and it's impossible to keep tabs on it.

You can only check in every so often and then you can't even on Roblox, you can't even put your child at the age that they are because they tell you that they can't do any of the things that they need to do with their friends. So you've already got to lie about their age so that they don't have a meltdown and tell you that you're ruining their life.

So it's always been a problem. You've only got to open up the news these days and read down your Apple News, BBC News, feed, whatever it is, you know, to see stories of people who've been taken advantage of on dating apps by people who pretended to be somebody

they're not and then and then stolen money from them abused them. There are people out there that pretend to be things that they're not. So it's not just something that's specific to technology.

It's just that as it is developed and as it is improved hopefully we can regulate it and make it better for everybody but there are also pluses to it you know there are people out there that are lonely that have nobody there are people that can't afford or get to the doctors you know to a counselor to be able to just have a conversation and maybe we're not there yet at that point but it's in the future of everybody to be able to have a medical diagnosis

from, you know, from a bot, so to speak, there's pluses and negatives to it all. So it's worth riding it out, I think. Tell us a bit more about the other things that you found in Silicon Valley and Meta. Meta make these glasses, don't know, that you showed us what they could do, which was quite phenomenal.

Yeah, well, I mean, so the stuff going to Meta, who was the parent company of Instagram and Facebook, was to show really what's out there now, And this is the first implementation of mainstream wearables, which are, as I said, if you go back, even not that long a few years, if you wanted a pair of glasses with a camera on for somebody who's blind, it would have looked like I'd made it, you know.

It would have been a hideous thing with a camera bolted on the side and you would have looked like you were wearing something weird. Whereas these are Rayban glasses that everybody wants. Everybody wants to wear. They just look like normal sunglasses. were built in cameras and already they offer hands-free accessibility functionality.

So one thing that blind people often don't have is two hands-free. You've either got a whole of a dog, you've got a stick, maybe you've got a bag in the other hand to have access or to have information provided to you from something you've got on your face

which is looking where you are looking but you can't see is a phenomenal step forward in accessibility. And that's out there now. That's something you can just go in the shop and buy for three or four hundred quid. It's already, I mean, it's not perfect. You get better, you get better results,

you get speedier responses, doing it through your iPhone. But, you know, everything's got to start somewhere and to have hands-free artificial intelligence, accessibility that is wearable, is a good start in that. domain you know it's going to improve and you can basically ask your glasses to describe what it is that you're saying can you tell me if you can see the door for the for the news agents can you tell me how much this is you can you can you look at a menu and say can you tell me what the categories are on the menu you know traditionally if you're doing something with OCR like optical character

recognition you would have said read the menu and it would have read the whole menu from top to bottom would it take you an hour to get to the desserts whereas AI is processing it and it's like having a person there that you can ask what's on the desserts is there anything chocolatey in the desserts they'll just tell you it's

it's such a phenomenal leap forward from what came before it that it's incredible I thought one of the most moving things was your experience of a driverless car now driverless cars over here make most of our listeners just throw up their hands in horror

we can't get our heads around it at all at all but let's go through the conduit of your curiosity and stoke because for you it was an extraordinary experience well it's i mean so you know we've gone from meta which is something that is out there now that everybody can buy to waymo which is a a google owned company who do the self-driving cars in san francisco and some other cities and that is you know they're present but it's our future you know it feels like the future even though it's out

there now and it's um first time i've ever been in the car this driving on me own you can you know, obviously I'm blind, so I can't, I can't, you know, I've never been able to drive a car. It was remarkable to have that sense of independence and peace and quiet and just have that space to yourself and not be around another human. It was quite refreshing. The safety of it is interesting because we always want someone to blame, you know, whose fault is it if there's an accident or an incident? And, you know, my background's in maths and, you know, statistics and things.

I did a lot of that in A-level. And if it's statistically safer, then surely it's safer, even though it could have incidents along the way. If it's having 8% of the incidents that human drivers are having, then surely it's a lot safer than humans driving. And the reality is that most accidents are not caused in the moment of the accident. most accidents are caused because somebody's tired or they've been drinking or they're looking at the phone they're talking to someone in the back seat they happen in the build-up to the accident

and if you remove all of those human you know faults so to speak you drastically reduce the amount of crashes or incidental occur there will be some and who do you blame for them that's the problem isn't it but already they talk about it as being the most experienced driver in the world

they don't really talk about it as being individual cars they talk about it as this one kind of driving brain that I think it's driven halfway to the sun so far in total and the number of incidents it had along the way are so remarkably small that it's I don't think you can you can ignore that

no I think it is a careful lady driver isn't it that's basically the category that it is I think a lot of people when they think of self-driving cars they think because Elon Musk's very vocal and he's got a very big personality he's always out there you know selling his words and people think of Tesla's

and with a self-driving functionality these cars are not that these cars have got such an array of sensors on them that they are they look very different to a commercial family car they're a car that's being souped up with like a wedding cake

of sensors on the roof and LIDAR sensors down the side and all these spinning bits on them They're quite, you know, futuristic in the way that they've been developed. But the guy was telling me that they had one, because they can't teach it every single scenario that it needs to decide what to do. They learn as they're going. And he was telling me that they had one car.

A bus had pulled across a crossroads, across an intersection, and was blocking like 70% of the intersection. So the car approached it slowly, went to drive around the back of the bus, and it stopped and waited. and as it waited a person walked out from behind the bus and it let the person get out of the way of the car and the car carried on driving and they didn't know how the car knew the person was there

because the bus was in the way and they went back and looked at the data and he said as the car approached the bus it saw two feet under the bus on the other side and it thought well if there's two feet there must be a person so I'll just wait for them feet to get out of the way

and it was like a human would never see those feet Yeah, no, that's so true. That's so true. And is there a bit of you, Chris, that really wishes that this technology had been available to you when you started to lose your site? I mean, not really, no. I mean, it's always developing, isn't it? And it's, you know, technology's always been something that I've been dependent on. You know, it's always been something that I've relied on. and to some extent whether it was specialist or mainstream technology and I couldn't have done without it

but you know you could say oh yeah I wish we had now what I had when I was younger but in 10 years time it'll be so phenomenally different that we'll look back at it now and go god that was rubbish wasn't it I wish I did now I wish I had what we got now but it's it's you know people out there listening to this would be yeah but what about you know what about the negative aspects of AI and interestingly you know there's a documentary on the BBC

not mine it's Horizon I've got a lot of the historical episodes on IPlayer if you go back there's an episode from 1977 on there from the year I was born and it's about the introduction of the microchip and if you take the word microchip out of it and put the word AI

it is so ridiculously similar the symmetry is remarkable the microchip is going to be taking people's jobs. Soon, you will not need cash. You'll be able to tap your card. And there will be no need for tellers in banks.

And this is from 50 years ago. And the world adapted, you know. It's, you look at the internet. The internet was introduced. And suddenly we've got no travel agents on the high street. But the, you know, the cost of holidays reduced. The more jobs became available in the holiday, in the travel industry. The world evolves and adapts

And we've had these same issues along the way And these same fears at different points With the internet, microchips, whatever it is And sometimes those travel agents sent you to very odd places Didn't they? There's definitely a backhander going on from Rob on the High Street in Hertfordshire And will you do more of these programmes Do you feel that this could be a quite a happy home for you?

Yeah, I think it's difficult with this specific area because the companies themselves are so secretive, you know, that we were invited into Apple. I love Apple. Apple has changed my life. You know, everything I use is Apple. Apple were the first mainstream company, the first company to really change how accessibility

was looked at by mainstream technology companies. But they don't tell you anything, you know. I said, what's the point? They won't tell us anything. By the time it's being on the telly, the new iPhone will be out. They won't even tell us about the iPhone. So it's difficult to kind of make these programs

about the advancements in technology when the companies are so secretive about their intellectual property. Which is why going to MIT as part of the one we did was great because they just want to show off with what they're doing because it's so bananas

and it's so kind of forward thinking. Yeah, but they're not in the closed lid yet. Yeah, no, no, no. and they want people to know what they're doing because they want funding and they want investment and things like that. So that's why going to MIT was like a real breadth of fresh air compared to some of these companies.

You know, we did do some filming at like OpenAI who make chat GPT and it was nice and it was interesting. It was good to be let in, but you don't learn much that people don't already know, you know. Yeah, but that's the really frustrating thing, isn't it? That's the bit that we're allowed to get really annoyed about, isn't it, Chris? that these companies, these massive companies that are making things that will change our lives

they do not want to share the process with us at all so if there is a flaw in a product if there is a downside to a new genre we are the guinea pigs we are the people who eventually have to tell them if we were all part of the process wouldn't it be better if we were all part of the process

we wouldn't we wouldn't understand how it worked I mean, we've all watched telly for years without really understanding how the picture gets on the box. I don't think we need to know how it works. We just need to trust the agents involved.

But your comedy, Chris, has probably already been scraped by AI in order to be regurgitated by people who aren't ever going to pay you for it. But I'm a comedian. The only reason I do comedy is because I have scraped Eddie Isard and I have scraped Jack D

and Alan Davis and I did comedy because I wanted to emulate those guys and I wanted to be a comedian like they were. The only reason Richard Osman writes good books is because he's read a lot of good books. To kind of say that AI is the only thing that is influenced or inspired or using styles and techniques of other writers is wrong. I'm not saying they shouldn't pay for access to this information,

but we all do it. We all emulate our heroes and the things that we like and we try and pass the ideas off us our own, don't we? Yeah, well, I love this perspective. I mean, I just think it's so healthy because the fear and the anxiety that so many people are carrying with them about AI

just can't be a helpful thing and the irony, Chris, as well, is that we will then probably turn to that same AI to help us feel better, well, I mean, like, You look at the real threat with AI isn't the kind of commercial version of it that we're all kind of getting worried about. The real threat with AI is what bad actors can do with it

in terms of if you can use AI to develop drugs and treatments for diseases at a rapid pace compared to traditional methods, then you can use AI to develop chemicals that can kill a lot of people. And so it's really what it's used for at that end of the wedge, I think, that is the scary thing. And, you know, whether it's reading books and writing poems for people or providing visual interpretation or, you know, all of these things are going to improve. And the internet is a very, very flawed environment.

You know, you've got the dark web proliferation of child pornography, but we all couldn't live without it. because it allows us to buy things and have them to deliver it to the house and use Wikipedia. It solves Christmas. AI will be the same. It'll be half good and half bad.

Chris, it's an absolute pleasure to have you on the podcast. Thank you very much indeed for coming into Times Towns today and we wish you a very happy Christmas. The book is available in the run-up to Christmas. We give it a hard recommend. It's called Keep Laughing. It's got a very, very nice cover as well. Yeah, so that's nothing to do with the documentary.

That's autobiography, getting into comedy, losing my sight, getting on the telly, doing all them shows that people know and doing strictly and stuff. And it's hopefully very funny. Hopefully people are like it. So a little bit of geekiness in it, but that's, you know... That's you.

Chris McCorsland, and it was just so nice to meet him. And the documentary is called Seeing Into the Future. That's available on the Eye Player. And he's got a fantastic memoir out as well. It came out earlier in the autumn. It's called Keep Lod. laughing. He talks about his blindness, about going into comedy, about resilience, about family life. He writes really, really well and has definitely one of those people who is happy to explore himself quite openly in his memoir. So that one gets a hard recommend as well.

Can I also just say, Merry Christmas to Emma McIntosh from my friend Jess, because I promised you're in the pub last night. I thought I would say that. You certainly can. So Merry Christmas, Emma. Yeah, well, there's got to be some perks to this job. My God, give me something. Any other people that you might have forgotten to give presents to at Christmas who you could just lavish a shout-out on instead? My boyfriend's sister's mother-in-law, Merry Christmas.

Hang on a sec. Your boyfriend's sister's mother, wow. Merry Christmas at the Ogdens. Okay. That's quite far out in the circle, isn't it? Yes, it's a bit. Yeah. Well, I would say a very proper, proper Merry Christmas

to all of you lovely people to listen. And I'm sure it's been a year for all of you. Everybody's life has bits and pieces that we don't want in it as well as the bits and pieces that we do. It's really delightful to be part of something which allows all of those bits and pieces to get a really good airing and amplification. We don't take it lightly that you listen.

We're incredibly grateful that you do. May all your tints will be perky. May your robins be read, and may your cranberry jelly come in a tin. Oh. It's just a notification from the Guardian. Fee. I'm joking. It's from the Times.

Merry Christmas. Merry Christmas, everybody. Merry Christmas Eve. Oh, that's weird, isn't it? Oh, I thought of that. I have had thought of that. I genuinely hadn't thought of that. Okay, everybody.

End on a gag. Congratulations. You've staggered somehow to the end of another off-air with Jane and Fee. Thank you. If you'd like to hear us do this live, and we do it live. every day, Monday to Thursday, 2 till 4 on Times Radio. The jeopardy is off the scale. And if you listen to this, you'll understand exactly why that's the case.

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