Tomorrow - Episode 32: Sam Biddle Wags the Valley

Episode Date: November 16, 2015

Sam Biddle – senior writer at Gawker and all around bon vivant – is a man who knows how to attract controversy. He sits down with Josh in a bedroom of a strange and possibly haunted mansion in upstate New York to discuss the thankless work of covering the dark side of Silicon Valley startups, the increasing toxicity of the internet, the mysterious appeal of Fallout 4, and the difference between Breitbart and Stormfront (spoiler: not much). Along the way Sam and Josh find a friendship that will last a lifetime, or at least until Sam puts Josh in the spotlight for being a snake oil salesman who's too busy getting high on his own supply to see the damage he's doing to the crafting industry. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey and welcome to Tomorrow. I'm your host, Josh Witts Polsky. Today on the podcast, we discuss crafting, public shaming, and Fallout 4. At first, a word from our sponsor. This episode tomorrow with Josh Witts Polsky, which is who's me, is brought to you by Wealthfront. Wealthfront is a low cost automated investment service that makes it easy to invest your money the right way. It works 24-7, that's by the way in case you're running, it's 24 hours a day, seven days

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My guess today is a controversial figure on the internet. A divisive man. Is divisive the right word? I think it is. Devisive polarizing. Polarizing. A man who's been described to some as the most hated person to ever have lived. That man is Sam Bittel, a writer at Gawker.

Are you, you're just a writer? What is your title? Senior writer. Senior writer. Oh, sorry. Senior writer at Gawker.com you, you're just a writer? What is your title? Senior writer. Senior writer. Thank you very much. Oh, sorry. Senior writer at Gokker.com. Sam, thanks for being here. My pleasure. Thank you for having me. Now I should say that Sam and I are at a remote country estate near Hudson, New York, with a group of people, group of friends. And I've stolen Sam away to, to interview him.

Finally. Yes. Well, listen, I said this before, before we recorded it, I would have invited you on the podcast at some point. I'm working my way through people. You're just very low on the list. Yeah, well you reign out of people in the Rolladex. Very low priority. My name's for time concern. No, I actually want to talk to you about a number of things,

but what I'm most excited about is at some point, we're going to talk about Fallout 4, which you've told me you're playing. I would rather be playing it right now. I think that goes for everyone who's playing fallout four. And I can certainly say that I spend most of my days now thinking about getting back into the world and fall apart.

We're in a gorgeous part of New York state. And right now I'm thinking about playing. One of the most beautiful places in the world. Yes. But before we get into that, because I know everybody, people may not know who you are. I mean, it's possible. They probably don't. It's possible. There's like a couple of people who don't earn aware of your work. You started as an intern at Gismoto. That's correct. What year did you start? 2010. So let's see, I was still

at the editor in chief of Engage. We were rivals. And we were rivals. And there was a heated, a violent competition. That's the between. Between Gizmodo and Engage. It's funny that I look back on and think about it because it seems so silly and retrospective. I think about it a lot. I think about you being this sort of Mussolini figure. I don't know why that was the first. Really Mussolini? I don't know why. That was just the first fascist I could think of. But this, tell me what it was like. I have no idea.

Tell me what it was like inside. Well, because, I've never heard this before. The only rivalry that mattered, well, the only competitor that mattered to us was Engage. This was pre-verge. This was not, it was, it was completely different.

Right, actually. I mean, that's saying because of the verge, but like, it just was a different time. Blog blogging was had just starting to really turn into something right that seemed more you could make money Yeah, and it seemed more real and people were taking it seriously and I think gadget blogging was also so growing Yeah, there was still a lot of turf to conquer. Yeah, and so we were we were we were head-to-head and You guys were the bad guys. Like, you know, it was like if we get beat by Engage it on this thing, we, we blew it. Like that, you know, it was a Yankees red socks thing to us.

So I don't know. For all I know, you guys did care about that at all. I mean, we cared. We cared when we, I think when it really mattered was like when we were covering big events. Oh, exactly. And we'd be like watching you guys and it'd be like who got what story up first and you know if, if you know, you guys used to have somewhere that we could see your traffic. I can't remember if it was like you're like a chart beat or you guys were doing something.

You were logged into our chart beat. No, no, no, no, no. I remember somewhere on Gaukra there was like here's our traffic. Oh yeah, I'm sure it's changed a lot. And there was some place where I remember you could look andker there was like, here's our traffic. Yeah, I'm sure it's changed a lot. And there was some place where I remember you could look and it would show like how you ferret on certain days or something. I remember like looking at that like during CES.

Looking at like CES days and going like, oh God, they, you know, like look they did, you know, X million more here. Whatever the numbers were, I don't even remember. We thought about Gismoto, we definitely thought about it. I mean, when I got, when I went to Engaget, that was like really bad. Because Ryan Block was the editor-in-chief and he had a father of tech blogger. Yeah, the Godfather.

Exactly how I would categorize him. He and Peter Ross founded Gismoto and then went and founded Engaget. Peter definitely is like the creator of gadget blogging as we know it. And Ryan worked in the very early days on end gadget with him. Did he work at Guismoto? I don't think he did. Ryan?

I thought he did. Maybe he did. That would have been before my- Yeah, long before I did. This is very early, early 2000s, mid 2000s, at any rate. I remember getting there and yeah, that was heated. Like, was Brian at Gismoto, Brian Lam, when you were there? He was the boss.

Okay, right. So Brian and Ryan had, we're definitely like rivals. There were also guys who like, when I would go to San Francisco to see Ryan, we would like go get dinner and Brian would show up. And it was this weird thing where they were really nice to each other in person, but then definitely had some kind of rivalry where they were at each other's throats, like on their respective team.

Right, right. Yeah, no, I mean, I think we used to get that out of shape about really funny things with Gizmo, you would like crop a watermark out of a picture or something, and I'd have to send an email to somebody. To like Brian and I would be like, what's up with this man? The pissy emails exchanged across lines were definitely part of the history.

It was great to see you came in as an intern. What did an intern do in the early days of Gismoto? An intern at Gismoto, well, what I was doing at Gismoto was to be staring into this infinite void of RSS feeds all day looking for. Oh, so you were like real material. Yeah, but I mean, not just the news, like really plumbing the depths of potential virality. So what did you guys use like Google Reader?

I don't, probably, I was using something that I think is now defunct like RSS Galaxy, net newswire. Oh yeah, net newswire. And I'll tell you, there like like RSS Galaxy net newswire. Oh yeah, that newswire. And I'll tell you there was this there was this RSS file that was handed down to the OPM L. Yes. Yeah. We had the same thing that was that it was like a zero X of a zero X of a zero X and it was so poorly organized.

Oh, every person who got it sort of made their own changes that made sense to them, but was completely opaque to whoever got it next and I Had to deal with that. That's interesting because because I think and I think this actually kind of perfectly Like sums up some of the differences between gizmo and engager We had this immaculately curated hand curated opml that we had like highly categorized and we in like you It was a shared, like only, there was only one master OPML

that was shared for anybody who was doing news, like anybody was like looking for stories. And we like, hean stakingly curated it and worked on it. And there were always, like, there were like every few months you do these revisions where somebody's like, all these feeds are dead and we're putting these new feeds in and these things aren't relevant anymore.

Like, we're taking Farc out. Remember Farc? Yes, of course. Is Farc still around? Yes, and I think he's either the guy is either running for a governor or is an elected official of Drew Curtis. That was his name, right?

The guy you found with that, I think. Is that a new son of Farc? Yeah. Well, that's very, that should be very worrying to all of us. But yeah, Farc was in there. We never called anything. You just left it all. Oh yeah.

Let's just deal with it. Yeah. Well, let this be a lesson to you. Two different approaches. Two different approaches. Can you both, can you go great results? Different results. Yeah.

By the way, I hear downstairs Zelda is here, and I hear her screaming. Enjoy, I believe. She hears you talking about in gadget. She's like, I love in gadgets. That was my favorite gadget blog. But on the side she read Gismoto. One of the things I discovered,

I actually thought was really interesting. There's definitely some screaming going on. Yes, there's. Is that like when we started the verge, I watched the verge grow in traffic and then also saw in gadget, which we'd a lot of bunch of people had left, and Gismoto sustained and grow traffic.

It was like a really interesting lesson, like you think like, oh yeah. These rivalries, you think like people are like, oh, it's Gizmodo or Engaget. The truth is that all of the readers of Gizmodo were also the readers of Engaget. And like there wasn't really, the competition was basically just to grow faster

because they were both growing at a very similar pace. It was people reading on their lunch break maybe. They had bored at work now. Yeah, they were. They were at a bored at work now. Sure. And they had some spare time and they would load up Gizmodo. They'd scan it for 30 seconds.

They'd load up and gadget. They'd scan it and then they'd go to the verge. Yeah. That's exactly what I remember. I remember how I used to read these sites before I worked at one. And yeah, you would read them all. It was ever one or the other. Tell me about the pre-intern gizmodo,

pre-internet gizmodo, San Bettle. You were, were you a nerdy? Were you very nerdy? I was, I was always a geek-oriented kid. I mean, I love putting together my own computers and I read, oh, I read these sites. The reason I wanted the world here is I really were in earth. With yeah, was because I wanted, I read it. I read, oh, I read these sites. The reason I wanted the world, I really weren't. Yeah, it was because I wanted it.

I read it every day in college, Gizmodo and Engage in those sites. And did you apply for a job at Engage? Uh, you know, I don't think, you know, I don't remember it. I remember, the reason I remember applying for the one at Gizmodo is because after I got hired, I went back through the intern application inbox

and found my application that had just never been read. Oh really? Yeah, which was great. We had a similar, I remember when I became editor in chief of Engage it, I finally got access to like our hiring stuff and these hiring email because we used to literally, I mean the way we hired people was we would set up like an open call. Maybe like, hey, we're looking for so and so. There was no application to fill out.

We were like, answer these four questions. And I went back through and found all these crazy applications. I saw, I found mine, which is great. But I also found all these applications. We actually ended up hiring a couple of people who were like, we had this one, this one guy, his name was Jacob Schulman, who actually is like now very successful, went to business school. And he was, and he was our first intern at, ever at, at Engadget. He had written when he was like 16. And he was like, I really want to work there. We're like at AOL, you couldn't hire anybody. It was

under 18. And so for like two years, we literally talked to him back and forth for like two years. And then finally when he turned 18, we're like, okay, you can be in a, right, right. And he was great. He turned out to be fantastic. And yeah, that story is a real meaningless aside. But just to say that like, it was interesting to see,

like, I mean, it was a very scrappy process. All right, so you were a nerdy kid. You became an intern in Guismoto. That's right. You worked there for many years. Yeah, two and a half. And then at some point, Gauker decided, somebody at Gauker decided that they were going to reboot value wag. Yes. Can you explain value wag for those

that the listeners who don't know what value wag is? Valleywag is Gaukers Silicon Valley or was Gaukers Silicon Valley startup gossip and news website? it's it's been Alive and dead and dormant and rebooted Four or five times that true four times. I believe three maybe three or four. Yeah You were in the wedding incarnation what number I was the latest and last that was probably maybe the fourth and it was you by yourself No, it was me by myself. And then we hired the extremely talented Natasha. Yes, yes, who had been at the observer, yeah, covering startups, especially in the New York scene. And then she, she joined and then she actually left to go to the verge. It's just, you know, it's musical chair. And then she, and then I think she left the verge.

And went to the body. Yeah. Yeah. A lot of moving around a lot of moving around today's And when it was the body. Yeah, yeah, yeah. There's a lot of moving around. A lot of moving around today's new journalism economy. So Valleywag, the purpose of Valleywag was like, anti-tech crunch. Anti-tech crunch, but it was really like a gossip rag for a sort of kind of Valley.

Yeah. I love the idea of an anti-tech crunch, by the way. Just generally speaking, it actually, this is a total off topic, but it's not totally off topic. I actually, for some reason, was going through, oh, I'm gonna tell, this is a really stupid story. I'm gonna go down a really stupid. Yesterday was Friday 13th, which turned out

to be a very horrible day because it was these horrible attacks. Sorry, you guys will be hearing this on Monday, but obviously on Friday, there were these terrible attacks, terrorist attacks in Paris. But earlier in the day when the shit was not hitting the fan, I was reminded by somebody who's an editor at NGEDJ that I started this thing at NGEDJ where every Friday the 13th that happened, we would subtly insert Jason Voorhees into all of the, into many of the stories that we did in photos.

So like there would be stories of like about a car and he'd be sitting in the passenger seat or like a story about, you know, like a new laptop and he'd be sitting in the passenger seat or like a story about you know Like a new laptop and he'd be in the reflection on the screen. Did you ever see any of this stuff? Yeah, yeah, and I was like oh, yeah, we used to do that. Yeah I was going back and I was looking through I was trying to find my posts from Friday the 13th on end gadget Because I wanted to see if any of those pictures were still around and I ended up go spulunking down this weird rabbit hole where I found This thing that I basically totally forgot that had happened where when Michael Aarrington,

when TechCrunch was sold to AOL, like Michael Aarrington started some art, like fight with me and engage it. And I can't believe you would ever go to a fight. And I remember like, we were all like, what the fuck is going on? Because none of us knew Arrington. Nobody had ever had an interaction with him.

We had no interaction with anybody tech-crunchy, knew none of those people. And he had this like crazy conspiracy theory about Engage that we were like trying to destroy tech-crunchy thing. And I went back and I found these business insider articles where he and I are like arguing with each other in the comments of a business insider article.

He's like saying that we're like, we did something we damaged him or we heard him in some way. And I'm like, literally, I have no idea what you're talking about, like, just explain what you're talking. Anyhow, totally off topic, but sort of related to the anti-tech crunch. I mean, tech crunch. No, look, there have been some lovely people who worked at tech crunch. I'm some of them, I can say. Michael Arrington is, uh, it was not when I would say it's not one of those lovely people I would not I don't think he's ever been described as lovely. I use a terrible dude

I mean he's just kind of a rotten person and uh and I have you know obviously I have no love for him But he's just a bad guy. He just treated people badly and everybody anybody who knows my clarin 10 is well aware of how bad it is It's one of these things where I think you can you can choose to be uh a, you can choose to be a crook, or you can be, you can only choose. He chose all of them. Yeah, you can only pick so many bad traits. I mean, we'll get to this and fall out for, I guess. But when you're choosing your persona,

it's like, you can't be all of the oppressive foul things. And he chose them all. And in Dungeons and Dragons, there is an alignment that nobody can truly play correctly, which is chaotic neutral, I believe. Chaotic neutral is like completely unpredictable and have no allegiance to good or bad. I would say anything, he would be chaotic evil, but I think it's evil the alignment, I think it is, but it's just great. And any read, chaotic greedy.

Greedy. It's not an alignment you can play and understand right? But it would be interesting. So anyway, so you, so value I was started originally as the anti-tech crunch, which is like a gossip brag about like people who were acting like dicks and so like, I mean, it was bad news about Silicon Valley, whereas TechCrunch was like, it often operates as sort of, like a middle school newsletter.

We had this assembly, it was great, the big sale was a success. Right, right, the field day is gonna be really fun. It's just all very rosy news. It's like if a newspaper just did upbeat positive stories. Right. Which is fine if you're, you know, of a local newspaper and grocery store or a middle school newsletter.

But this is one of the largest, I don't know, their traffic, but one of the most popular times. It was a very, very, very, it's still, it's still big. It's still, it's still, it's still weirdly influential. I don't know why. But they're covering arguably the most important sector of the economy right now, or at least the most rapidly changing. But it's a trade, it's basically a trade publication

for Silicon Valley. But it was one that like had, Aranton had numerous conflicts of interest. He was an investor in the, many of the companies that they covered. And many of their writers had lots of conflicts of interest. But I think it's sort of like, and it was a perfect example of some of the blindness and sort of like bubble reality

that the Valley lives in. No one cared. Right. Was the funniest part to me, was that? Right, people were like, yes, so what? Yeah, you know, put it this close to the bottom. It's one of my biggest pet peeves is this idea that if you put it this close to the bottom bottom. My biggest, one of my biggest pet peeves is this idea that if you put it this close here at the bottom of a story,

you somehow have like, removed any possibility that you still did some wrong with the story. You're just confessing that it was a bad look. Hey, look, you know what, there's a conflict. I'm just telling you about it. And I think that was actually a guaranteeing thing where he was like, yeah, as long as we just close. It's like, no, actually.

They didn't even always disclose. They didn't really start disclosing it until we got public. Right. Tell them. Anyhow, so Valleywag originally, it's going to be the bad news for Silicon Valley. It ended up piercing the bubble. Speaking of Aarrington, he once described it, and this was maybe in like, oh wait, before I was doing it, he described Valleywag as the alcheta

of Silicon Valley. And he was known for, he was known to be hyperbolic. But I do think that there was something to that. You think that it was a terrorist organization? I think it was an entity that struck fear into people who were used to not being afraid. They could rely on universally positive press. And suddenly, here was an outlet, a small outlet, but an outlet that was reporting bad news

and bad actors and people operating in bad faith. And it scared the shit out of a lot of people. You know, I mean, so come Valley, certainly do not. And they still have a problem with dealing with the actual press coverage. When you look at this, Theranos coverage and the way that has netted out

and their reactions to it, some of the stuff with Am. I mean, Amazon isn't really a Valley company but they may as well be having a similar idea. There is a sense amongst people in the Valley, I feel like that they're like, it's like, give us some space, okay? Just let us do our thing. We're changing the world.

We're dreamers. It's sort of the response that I think people, sometimes in the music industry have, where they say, well, you're not a creator, you're not making art, you don't get it. Who are you to come in and tell me how to do my art? It's a great point. Well, that's like a criticism of criticism,

which is really false, flat for me, because it's like, you can have a critical thought or you can understand something in a way that doesn't require you to have been able to make it. You can report something or research something to a degree that allows you to tell a story about a piece of art or a product or whatever that in no way relates to your ability to have done to make the product. Especially when your product is underpants on demand. Or is that a real business? It was, or it was like a box, there was some,

one of the earliest, who said it on Valleywag was about a company that got a bunch of venture funding. I think they would just mail you boxes of underwear like every month, like sort of like a blue apron for contact with you. I feel like homeboughts and do you need, I mean, at some point you're like every month, like sort of like a blue apron for content. I feel like home often do you need, I mean, at some point you're like,

okay, I have enough underwear. I just wash these. What's going on in your life that you need a, because I just need a stream of underwear. Right. Coming in, okay. You know, I should, this is a good opportunity to talk about a startup I've been thinking a lot about,

which I think it's safe to say I'm not going to work on. But if somebody, I just want to preface this by saying, if somebody takes this idea and creates a company out of it, I demand 10% of all proceeds. Sure. Which I think is very fair, really. The idea, the app is called Shuber. It's Uber for shoes. What you do is you point your phone's camera at your feet and you can use an augmented reality, try on different pairs of shoes and then have them shipped directly to your home.

They wouldn't drive them to you. They said, no, no, no, no, there's no drive. Well, presumably they're shipped on and they're on a truck or something. They wouldn't come within like an hour. No, they're not, well, I mean, that could be a component of shoes. That could be like,

Shuber Black. Shuber Black would be, Shuber XL would get your shoes to you in less than an hour. And, you know, I just want to say, like, I think it's the time has come. I think trying on shoes is time consuming and, so do it. They're too much to do it, but somebody else can do it.

The dreamers and the haters. Well, I dream. I dreamed and now somebody has to take my dream and turn it into reality. Schubert, T.M. Someone will take that. I hope they will. I have a lot of good ideas that I'll never execute on

So you'll be the winkle vass of a shuber though? Well, no because because I'm getting putting it out there It's almost like I'm almost saying like this is like a get rip this like a repository my right now This is an audio repository. You can take it, but I want to cut. That's really no It's a little not totally open source. It's like medium, what's like a thinness half open and half closed? A jar source. Yeah, a jar source. Yeah. Okay. Anyhow, you were saying, uh, what were you saying? I don't. It was about the alcheta of, yeah, so Silicon Valley. This was probably an oh, wait, we were described as the the alcheta of Silicon Silicon Valley Michael Errington

Who has since disappeared into the show? Yeah, really really like on underground. Yeah, who knows what he's doing That's and that's fine with me. I hope it's listening to this right now Yeah, he also um he he speculated that Value-wag would drive someone to suicide Yeah, they're so dramatic some of these silicon Valley guys are so dramatic and then so that was a reason why it shouldn't exist Yeah, someone was gonna kill well I mean, I think that's a good reason why a lot of things like if friends is if you think about writing a sad song And then you think about like well, what if somebody hears a sad song and it's so depressed by it that they kill themselves

Maybe you should stop yourself from writing the song if your startup is so bad that you kill yourself because it's been pointed out How bad it is I you know, I might have been not entirely the fall of the river. Right, right. But that was the existential threat. So you weren't part of the first iteration of Valiwag. I was the most recent, not the first. No, no, no, I'm saying, not the first. Oh, no, no. So you were part of the third iteration,

third or fourth, down the line. And was the mission any different? No, I mean, because Valiwag has gone in and out of existence. Why can't Denton decide? Why can't he make up his mind on whether he wants Valuette to exist? It's never a matter of that. I think it's that it's a hard job to do for more than I did it for a year and a half and I sort of had to stop. Did you find it emotionally taxing? Yeah. It was extremely draining.

I mean, you were sort of, I think what's notable about you is that you found very personal stories, very like focused, you focus on people, right? Like characters. You like characters, like Dave Moren's wife. Brit, the fabulous Brit, yeah. Dave Moren is the founder of Path. He was like one of the, don't even remember what that is though.

One of the original still in business, still in business. He's a nice guy actually. I've never met him But he's a lovely guy founder of path, which has not been a success. No, and you Focused on his wife who has a startup of some type what does the startup do? What does it do that's that's a hell of a question? They must do something, right?

It was an arts and crafts startup that would sell you arts and crafts kits, arts and craft kits, where you can make life. If you want to become like a sculptor, it's like popsicle sticks and washy tape. You know this shit you see

at a really Tweet wedding as a centerpiece? It was DIY kits for that shit. Okay. Which is nothing wrong with that. So like the DIY kits for like, this is not a good example, but like you know how I went during Christmas time, people make those like strings at a popcorn

and put it around the tree. Well this would be the kind of kit where they'd sell like a needle, thread, and popcorn, put it in a box and charge you $25. And they call it like what they call it, like pop, with an exclamation mark. I'm sure. Or jingle pop.

Yeah, yeah. Okay. And it's $25. And the company had $1,000,000 in funding, which is what got me. I don't know. They would pop the popcorn for you. I think you had to pop it yourself.

Yeah, yeah. I think they wouldn't even be pre-popped. We don't know, by the way, I want to just want to disclaimer. I don't know if they make a product like the one I'm describing. I've never actually seen anything that the company makes. They weren't. You thought, you thought.

They weren't as good as that. You seemed to feel particularly bothered by Britt Mourins. It wasn't even her. I mean, I'm sure she's a nice, I've never met her. I'm sure she's a nice person. Most people are pretty nice. Although someone told me, someone who worked there

once told me that there was a picture of me in the office that was not flattering. Oh really? Like what? I'm like written on it or something. I don't even know if that's true. Oh, they don't have that. Yeah, something like that.

I'm saying better, I suck. Yeah. Oh, how mean? DIY. Wow, it's like the fact. Chaming they're doing it to, it's a little epileter or whoever. Is that, is that the brand? Where? Isn't there a brand? Wow, it's like the fat shaming they're doing. It's a lily pilleter, whoever. Right, is that the brand?

Where? Isn't there a brand? Oh, yeah, they make jumpsuits. Is it lily pilleter? Lily Pulser, Dixeter. They had fat shaming in their office. Right, they had pictures of the fridge. Yeah, on the fridge, just great snacks.

Anyway, they, yeah, that was a... I'm very uncool. Anyhow, so you use a similar picture of you at some startup, which is called Brit and Co Brit and Co okay and and look I don't have anything against crafting. I think that it's a fun You know, it's a you probably do a lot of crafting and fall out for I Not as much as I should yeah, tell me about top to find those materials anyhow It was there was nothing wrong. Yeah, this was like my whole thing with value egg and Silicon Valley in general. There's nothing wrong with having

With getting your friends together and doing crafting kids and shit and if you want to do that, that's great But then taking millions of dollars from venture capitalists who are giving you millions of dollars to sell Boxes of junk to people for $25. It just seems like an inefficient way for the American economy to function. I don't know. I mean, it sounds like a million dollars. It sounds as if it's an option to me. I've been going to Michael's.

People have been going to Michael's for how many years. Now finally, the whole kids delivered to their door. Right. I think my problem with this idea is like, I feel like there's something better you could do if you could sense it. Like the thing I just mentioned where it's like, oh, you want to learn to sculpt. Like we'll send you the kit that's like the clay and like a stand and a guide and some of that.

Like that's actually kind of cool. We're like a painting kit. This wasn't crazy at all. This is not like that. It was more like paint by numbers or something. And I, the thing that never changed as long as I was writing at Valley Wag was that the ideas never stopped being dumb and they never stopped being rewarded. There was no correlation between goodness or smartness of an idea or cleverness or originality

and money. The money would keep landing with people who had shit ideas that were not viable to be companies. You don't want in your opinion. In my DC. You don't work at Google Ventures. I wish I were a VC, the easiest job. I think you'd be an amazing VC. Have you ever reached out to you and said like come

and be a VC? This might shock you, but no one. You know, because I feel like with a critical eye like this. I think that wouldn't be the worst VC I think I actually wouldn't be the worst VC. I've I've joked about with my friend Mike Isaac who works at I love my time great great great He's a spokesperson for Charmin. Yes. Yes. He's he's Sponsored by Charmin. He is actually a big Charmin shill Yeah, but when we're ready to sell out that'll be little be the root He's sponsored by Charmin, for what I'm saying. He is, he's actually a big Charmin shill.

But when we're ready to sell out, that'll be the root. You and Mike are gonna become VCs. Yeah, maybe. I might get, I might get to see very easily becoming a VC. Because not because he seems like a VC type or whatever, but he hasn't made a career out of attacking people

or anything. He's still his friends there. I think he's very good at what he does, but he's not like, publicly shaming Britt Morn or anything for her bad ideas. Well, I wouldn't even call it shaming. All right, he's the wrong word. You know, if she felt a shame, that's different. But I was just saying, this is a dumb company, and that's okay.

But what isn't okay is the the the agilatory press coverage and the millions of dollars in venture funds. I see that I agree with. I think that's it. That's it. Like I think that the one of the biggest problems and at least in the tech world and like having really seen this from from inside and also been having been part of a startup you know and knowing what the climate is like in a startup. And there is like, it really is a problem that we don't, we aren't producing more extremely critical reporters and thinkers in the media.

Like, I just think that in that space in particular, there's a tremendous amount of control that's still exerted by companies and the big companies. And then with a smaller companies there's like there is this kind of well in this together vibe that you like find with a lot of the reporters. I mean I know a lot of really good reporters who don't feel that way but there's plenty there's a hundred for every one really good one there's a hundred who are like, yeah I'm coming to your party like let's get drinks like in the you know this they don't know where the schmuz line ends and where the reporting line begins.

There was there was someone at TechCrunch I forget who it was and it might have been more than once. But the ethos there is that they are a pro startup publication. And they say that as something to be proud of. You can be pro the idea of startups without being pro specifically. Yeah, I mean, imagine the business section of the times or any newspaper saying, we're a pro oil sector paper. We can still be impartial, but we're pro oil company. But startups, but let me gonna challenge you a little bit and then I wanna take a break.

I'm gonna challenge you a little bit and say, startup oil is like an industry. The startup industry is actually not an industry like as a, I mean, there's like Uber, which is a transportation company, right? They're in competition with taxis and subways and whatever else, right? I mean, the startup world as a,

well, I should have put this, as a cultural movement is definitely a thing. Like, as a cultural space where there's a certain type of culture, but startups themselves are really just small businesses. Sure. And it is like their modern small businesses, most of them are based around the use of technology

to push that business forward or beyond what people have done in a similar sector. So like there are pure, you can look at things that is very pure startups, like color would be one. Yes. You remember color? I was banned from color on the first day.

People don't remember color, maybe that well. I think about it all the time. It was fun. It was fun. It was fun. To the tune of like $40 million. I think it even had like several rounds of fun and it brought it to that number. The idea was it was in photo app where you could be in a place

and take pictures with other people and it would aggregate them all. Actually, I don't remember. Is that what it was? I don't remember. I think that's what it did. It's like you would take pictures, you'd all be in a concert. Like not you all.

Like everybody would be in a concert. You'd take pictures and you'd upload them to color. And then it would like aggregate. It's like, you would take pictures, you'd all be at a concert. Not you all. Like everybody would be at a concert, you'd take pictures and you'd upload them to color, and then it would like aggregate them and be like, oh look, everybody's at this event, here's all this stuff. Now, weirdly it turned out that all you need to do was like turn on geolocation and Instagram or any other photo app and it does exactly the same thing. So that might have been the problem with their premise,

but they raised $40 million, they had a huge launch at South by Southwest. It was like, it was also kind of like yo, remember yo? Of course. That was gonna be a thing. Yo was a turning point. Secret. Yes.

Secret was gonna be a thing. That was gonna be a big. I like secret. Secret was silly. But yeah, that also. Promise secret is anybody. Is it? And the promise secret is anybody can game a secret.

You can literally put anything you want on secret and it becomes just basically real. Sure. And we've also seen more recently how something like Yic-Yak, which is basically the same premise, can be extremely toxic. Right. Obviously. But anyhow, but that's like, I think the colors are really like pure startup. It's in like squaring the text base totally like it's just a mobile app, but still like,

it's a photography application, it's a type or whatever. tech space, totally like a just a mobile app, but still like, it's a photography application of some type or whatever. But I don't know why I got off talk. No, you were saying that, these are small businesses. You can imagine, so you can imagine, I can imagine the business section of the New York Times saying we're pro small business,

or we're pro business, let's just say that. I think even that's a problem. We even got some real problems. I think that's a problem. But you have to be you have to accept that like business has some value, both positive and they I guess it really should be you're right. I mean, you really have to say like we're pro and anti business. You can essentially you want to be in the middle. I think I think that the business section of a newspaper can say we

acknowledge that business is is a mandatory part of modern of the modern world and the functioning of society We're not saying you're pro-pro-pro- I think it's probably you want to further Business I guess I'm thinking like I guess I'm kind of putting myself in the mind on the head in the head space of people who would be Working in the business actually your time time. Like those people love business Well, you know, they love covering business. I don I don't think Mike Isaac or someone else would say he loves business. He loves business.

He loves business. He loves business. He loves doing business. He's a mover and shaker, but you're a hustler. I don't think the people who love covering and reporting on businesses would describe themselves necessarily, maybe some would, as pro business. Yeah, you're right. I'm not disagreeing with you. Pro startup is not a term I would want to use

to describe my startup coverage. I can do that. Yeah, because that just basically says, you're going to lean more towards favorable coverage than you would if you had a very neutral viewpoint, which is like, well, we'll see. And you can, it's not to say you can't think a certain startup is cool as shit.

You can say, I should start up. Ship. What is that? A certain startup is cool as shit. Yeah. You can say, I should start up. I should start up. A ship. What is that? SHYP. What is that? They will come to your house. You take a picture. Let's say I want to, let's say my buddy lives in Seattle, leaves a pair of shoes in my

house. He's staying with me for the weekend in New York. I take a picture of those shoes. Someone comes to my apartment, takes the shoes, boxes them up, ships them. In front of you? No. Bought just in front of you? They're there for an ungun from out of time.

No, they take them with you. What do you like to, like, a weed? You're sending weed to Colorado. You could, I mean, I don't see any reason why you wouldn't be able to use it for weed. Sorry, I cut you off, but you were saying, you were saying, well, because look, going to the post office really sucks. I don't even use it for weed. Sorry, I cut you off, but you were saying, you were saying,

well, because look, going to the post office really sucks, and, you know, before that, oh, you make it a point about startup, a business coverage. Oh, business coverage. I think that you can be, you can, you can say, I think the startup is great. That doesn't mean that your pro startup,

you can, and it's good to have opinions. I don't think that you, you have to be non-apinionated. You can say these people are doing cool work and interesting work and these people are garbage and they don't deserve $20 million for Peter Till. Just think about all the money that's been wasted. I think about all the money. Has anybody calculated all the startups that have failed and how much money is been spent on them

It's a good that's a good article And then and then if you just put it in like the S&P 500 and yeah Just invested in yeah in or if you just like put it into education in America Yeah, we're just fed starving people were literally is burned or am I like gave homeless people a place to live? Yeah, I mean anyhow that's okay. I want to take a break Okay, and then we'll be right back with more sandbattle like gave homeless people a place to live. Yeah. I mean, anyhow, that's a, okay, I want to take a break. Okay. And then we'll be right back with more sandbettle. How we missed it, no one knows.

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We were just talking about the startup world. The startup world. His hatred for it. His hatred for all startups. Except for ship. Who's not a sponsor i just want to say no not you're not no i have been in ship are you i have zero financial state i've only started on them i really i've never you know i'm i'm i 401k might have tech companies in it i have no idea actually i'm very financially

or investment ignorant so i'm not even sure what's in my 401k. Yeah, that's welcome to the club. Yeah, I mean, I literally have a person who does that for me because I don't understand, I don't know anything about money. Yeah, I'm very bad with it, generally speaking, same for myself. Right.

But anyhow, so ValueAgg went away. So it's very good. We're just doing your background now, but I feel like, in the midst of that, we're having a really interesting conversation. But so ValueAgg went away, and then, and now you're just our Gawker guy. It went away in, in, in, not just a Gawker guy.

Well, I, you know, the Gawker. For nine hours of the day, it's what I do. You're, you're one of the most controversial figures at Gawker. You, you think so? You've created a lot of passion around your stories. I'm passionate. You're a passionate guy. I'm a passionate guy.

And you trigger passion feelings in other people. Yeah, well, you know, like, for instance, the gamer gate community. Yes, that trigger passion feelings in the gamer gate community. They are, there have been other instances. Some I can't name, I can't talk about. You know, I can think of some, but I don't want to, you know,

drag you through a painful. I appreciate that. I don't want to have to recap all of the painful experiences. I don't know if therapy until Thursday, so I'd rather do have therapy on Thursday. This Thursday, I need to get a therapist. This is something I've been wanting to do for a long time. I'll set you up. Maybe I should go to get a therapist. Like as a group, you just do like couples therapy with your person. That should be a thing. Couples there for just people. Yeah, that's not about I am.

But no, but like you actually, I just wanna say like, I had a thing, I've talked about this now like six times in the podcast because it's so fresh in my mind. But I tweeted something about guns a couple of weeks ago where I'm a couple months ago, I remember what you thought. And like for 24 hours I was like attacked by gun nuts because of, which is the scariest. Because of Nero scariest because of Nero

Because of Nero and a bunch of other dipshits on like who are like phony right wing whatever they are gun people are Scary my and like they actually they have guns They have guns and like it was a really my favorite one and I've already said this So if you've heard this already in the podcast I apologize for talking about it But I just this one I think was like I felt was such a strange I was talking about it, but I just, this one I think was like, I felt with such a strange bastardization of my anti-gun tweet.

I have like a few women, I think this is like definitely like, these are either bots or they're like being sent. It's like some kind of weird level of, it's like a weird propaganda coming from the NRA or something. Women who were like, don't tell me that I can't use a gun to defend myself against rape. And it's like, wait a second. It's like, so I'm pro rape.

Basically, you are. That's what you said. You're so rape if you're anti-gun. Right, yeah. It's just like, that's kind of not, that doesn't really work. Look, I'm against nuclear war, which means I endorse a scenario in which

someone gets raped because they couldn't drop a nuke on the rapist. You know? Or because they weren't killed by a nuclear weapon. The amount of work that goes into finding counter-argument, insane counter-argument is dizzying. And then I also had, there was a bit of good, it's like, I had people who were anti-Semitic who were like, you know, you Jew or something like that. And then I had people who were like, well, you got to have a, like, anti-Semitic guy.

But then there were people who were like, we got to defend Israel using guns or something It was like whoa both it's amazing how much the crazy people of some of you are so much diversity They agree. Yeah, they really agree so much People don't realize how much diversity there is in groups of people who are totally insane about issues You know yeah from all walks of life, but But what I was gonna say is that you have been certainly targeted by groups for saying things that or writing things that they didn't like. Sure.

Does this make you, I mean to me, I've never been in a situation where like, you know, 4chan was like docks in my home address and like sending me, you know, letter bombs or whatever the 4chan guys do. But by the way, 4chan guys, big fan of your work, level you do, keep doing, keep on keeping on, keep fighting. Keep fighting the good fight, you're awesome.

But, you know, are you like, you ever fear like actual physical repercussions for the stuff that you write? Because you don't pull punches. Sometimes, I mean, it only takes one really crazy person. Right. And to end you. Yeah, right.

And I'm pretty weak. I'd be pretty easy to kill. Yeah, you're not a fighter. Right. Like, what am I going to do? What am I going to do? I mean, I can tell you, now I know Sam, I'm sitting in that cross for Sam.

It's easy to wrestle me to the floor if you want to do it. From a physical standpoint, he's not intimidating character. I'm wearing a sweater. You're thinking about targeting him for a physical attack. I can tell you, you won't have a fight. You won't have anybody put up a fight against you. I'd yield. You'd yield and do whatever you ask.

All right. I think you're right. Look, I mean, I look, I'm not like the people who have it, the worst are women on the internet who are receiving actual credible threats of violence and harm. Oh yeah. I have nothing that can compare to that. I mean, there isn't, there is an unmitigated piece of humanity that exists now on the internet

that is like white male rage that is largely directed at women. Certainly people of color are getting it a bit. I mean, I felt, this is, I've said this again, I've said it before, but I felt like I understood for a brief moment what it would be like for a woman on the internet who's even remotely outspoken or not even outspoken, who just thinks that they're like living their life on the internet.

Like I felt like I understood it for 24 hours. This is how bad it could be, or maybe just the beginning of it. I mean there is something like, to me that seems like one of the biggest, most like confusing problems that we have right now in terms of how people behave with each other. I worry that the internet will stop being functional

to a certain extent, or it will become less functional in a really profound way, because it will be just so toxic. Like you won't be able to say anything without getting a death threat, you won't be able to have it and having a body threat. How do you fight that? I have no fucking clue.

I think that Twitter is pretty lax about how they, Twitter is terrible. I mean Twitter is terrible. There's no recourse when you're being attacked. If they have their food budget and shout out to the Twitter cafeteria, their once was delicious. Really well. Listen to that.

There's disclosure. San Biddle taking handles from Twitter. On the take. What did you have when you were there? I actually think I might have eaten there once because I was talking to a, I was working on a story. Yeah, same I was like, can we have lunch in the Twitter cafeteria? You tell they get you they have they have what you have once you have the lunch And they're like, hey, right free food right now you're on our payroll

But if they took part of that money and and hired a larger staff of people to block People who are threatening the money. To my rate. I think they need a button. I highly suggest they have a button which is like block everybody who's following this person. Oh yeah.

Like because if you were to. Because they're block bots you can use. Yeah but they're not really, they're not, you need like a one click solution which is like block or mute all followers of this person for five days. Well you know I think the Twitter doesn't want to add robust blocking features because then they're admitting that they have a largely toxic user base, which is the case, but also, like, you know,

well, also the more people who get banned the fewer, you know, you're likely to use those, you know, like, there, you know, that have users rolling in. Like, Twitter's in a tough position because they're struggling on Wall Street with stagnant growth, but on the other hand, they have to keep blocking ISIS members. So like, you know, they, they, uh, it's a tough spot. It's a spot. It's like, it's a tough spot. You know what's interesting is like, what's interesting is that Facebook doesn't, I mean, Facebook is a cesspool in another way. Yeah. I mean, if you like look at, like,

I look at my Facebook comments sometimes, and which I hardly ever do, they've actually reduced the presence of those comments so much that it's very much an afterthought, a lot of ways, like it to me it's like YouTube. Right. I look at YouTube videos all the time, I never read YouTube comments. YouTube comments are either YouTubers CNN are literally the worst,

sometimes I try to rank them in my head of which are the worst on the entire internet. All I think anything politically, anything like this actually political, like I did a column for the Washington Post for a while those comments were insane really really crazy. Like one it was like outrage people who were trolls in the internet then there was also a lot of old angry people who were just like did not get it but I think once picked up a story of mine reason once picked up a story of mine that I'd written for the post about

socializing wireless and And those comments. Then you're in trouble. Those comments were really choice. Yeah, I'm sure. They were really, really special. Right. But like reason, that's actually one of the more middle of the road publications by comparison now.

Right, right, right. Right, right. Yeah. I mean, the distance between Breitbart and Stormfront is like, you know know of which is like a I think stormfront's writing is actually a lot better Away from stormfront is like a Nazi is a Nazi. Yeah, look at white supremacist neo-Nazi website Listen, you know stormfront there free free freedom of speech are entitled to their absolute Bright part is a better layout beautiful writing bright bar. Bright Bart, I don't think I, I don't know if I can't even recall having gone to,

I mean maybe on my phone, I guess. I try not to visit Bright Bart. You know, like generally speaking. Yeah. Now when people hear that, I think when people hear that, like, oh, you don't wanna hear the other issues, the other side's issues, you know, and it's like, I wanna hear like people

on the other side of these issues who can make an argument that doesn't sound insane. Yeah, like, and I mean I mean, I'm accepting, I will listen to a pro-life argument. I think there's merit in the argument. I understand why people would say it. I think there are people who make a very reason and impassioned argument for being pro-life.

Now, I disagree with them. But then they're like, bright barbed. Then they're like, bright barbed. Dialogue is overrated. I mean, there are a lot of people who's side, I just have zero interest in hearing. And if you're on Breitbar, writing articles about the scourge of black on white crime

and how homophobia is a myth. And I don't wanna hear from you. I can't help but feel that, yeah, I mean, they're really like some of these things are just like you don't sound like you're part of this reality. You can just you can just disqualify yourself. You just not but I mean I think this is actually like when I when I read and think about like the way ISIS reacts to modern society and what they think and what they

are what their trip is. I have the same reaction I think there is some like there is some connective tissue between the extreme right and you know, on the same bright bar, but certainly there are certain, there are components of it. And the way that like extremist think, like Muslim extremist think, you know, I think, I, most of it is just like anti-modernity.

I think that's like the main thing. It's like anti-modernity, it's anti-the-march of thing. It's like anti modernity, anti the march of society. It's so fearful. It's so the idea of xenophobic and insular. Creeping progress. They're very, the internet right is terrified of anything that resembles reform. It's so weird too because it's fairly fairly obvious to me that despite all of the conservatives and right wing's best efforts, like the future is more liberal, more progressive, more open, more caring, less judgmental.

I mean, all of it is moving in that direction. This generation's not gonna go backwards now. Like you're not gonna go back to some like, it would take a lot. Yeah, it would take a lot. Yeah. And on that point, I think we should type a fallout for Apocalyptic way so are you like a big gamer? I am I am a yes Just what's what's the last game that you finished? Oh?

I'm so I'm bad at finishing them. I'll get like 90 I'm like 90% through Witcher 3 Which is just so long that I couldn't finish I liked it, but I just what's good about I don't understand I tried to play it just like story The horse was always getting stuck on things. What's the story? I don't even know what's the story Arkham Arkham night Yeah, I played a bit of that I finished that one. I played the beginning of that. It was fun I've been playing assassin the newest assassins Creed hate assassins create very frustrating none of those games ever worked for me for some reason I just they I never got into it yeah I don't know why I followed forward it's been great so far it is the same game is Fallout 3 it's literally identical the graphics are a little bit better I'm like I would need to see a side by side

not telling you trust me like people don't't remember like the 360 graphics or if the PS3 and are you a PS3? Okay. So are you fine now for? Yeah, for. Okay. I of course have both because I've got to have, you know, every fucking thing playing both at once. Yeah, I play I have two, and I get them upside-by-side. No, but the graphics are better. Of sure, yeah, yeah. But they are the same kind of graphics. It's not like, wow, they've got a whole new engine. For instance, Far Cry, do you play Far Cry? Yeah, yeah.

Far Cry 3 and 4 are like stunning, beautiful. Like, there are times that like in Far Cry 3 and 4, well, I'm playing 4 now, a bit in 3, this was very true, I played for hours. I like any game where you can walk around and not do anything, which is very true of Fallout and Far Cry, like you have a lot in common. There are moments in Far Cry where I'm like,

I just wanna look at this scenery because it's so beautiful and so interesting. I, there haven't been a lot of moments like that in Fallout. The fall games are ugly. And I guess that they're, of course. They're course. Like part of it, that is that it's like an ugly world, right? Like it's a new, both nuclear graveyard,

but like, you know, the faces all look kind of shitty. Yeah. And these are also sort of like charming staples of the franchise. Right. I mean, it is. That's a rough around the edges. It is, yeah.

Rough around the edges is definitely how I describe it. I mean, it's definitely like, I mean, I want in all games, I want the graphics to be as realistic as possible. Like my dream, my dream is like that the game looks so real that it looks like a photo. You know what I hate? The like eight-bit retro fad in indie games.

Oh, I like it. I like the aesthetic. For certain games. I like the aesthetic, but they're, I give me the like, the number of PS4 titles that are like, harcening back to you. Yeah. Yeah. As he has, give me some of you that looks fucking incredible. A thousand. A thousand. A thousand. A thousand. A thousand.

Yeah. A thousand. Yeah. Give me something that that blues my mind. Well, that's all the AAA games are like the ones that are supposed to blow your mind. But in the isolation, unbelievable, unbelievable. I couldn't play for more than two hours. So, yeah, I actually am literally at the end of almost at the end of that game. Finally, I've been playing it for like, how long has been out a year? I've been playing it for a really long time. It's one of the best looking games in Dribbs and Dribbs. Unbelievable,

looks really, that's a game where sometimes I'm just admiring the scenery. I'm like, wow, this just looks awesome. I do think that you're not going to get, I mean, most indie developers don't have the resources to produce that kind of game. I think that requires a lot of manpower, you know, really. And some do, some do look good, but very rarely, but Fallout does kind of look like, it almost does look like an indie game. Yeah, I know, it looks like a mod of like a different game

or something, but I love it, I love it. There's something charming about it. I bet it's a game buggy. I mean, it's like when you talk to people, the camera's like pointing in the wrong direction, or I had a conversation with a guy and his back was turned to me the whole time. That happens all the time.

Right. It's like they're like, we're gonna settle out of this on autopilot and it's just gonna work. And 90, 80% of the time it works. But what about it is good. I can't. What do you mean?

I love the game. What about fallout for what's good? No, no, no, no. But it's hard for me to pinpoint what about, it's so easy to point out the bugs and the flaws. But it's hard for me to explain why I love playing it so much and why it's so fun and why I get sucked. I play until my eyes.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, I think I just spent so much time thinking about it and playing it. Well, I haven't spent as much time as I want because I have a life, but I'm like, I get like ready in the evenings, like when he puts out at a bat, I'm like, I'm like, I'm right, right, right.

I'm trying to play follow-up. What is it? What do you think? So here's what I think. Well, I'm gonna just, this is me just spit-bought. I don't actually know. So first of all, I think that it has a really charming, like the art direction of it is really charming.

All that 50 stuff and like the Pip Boy and all the like the weird like atomic age shit. Like I think it did a really good job of painting this like universe of like kind of like the optimism of America, 1950s America, taken to this like kind of logic, the horrible conclusion. I think that is very charming and it feels like a very realized world. Like all of the parts of it feel like something

you can imagine having happened, having been created. I also think like for me, there's just enough story to make it to keep you moving forward without so much story that you feel like you're playing somebody else's game. You know, like a lot of games, it's like, oh, okay, you know, like even an alien isolation, there are moments where you are not in control at all and major things are happening. You're like, okay, I'm just happening now. Fallout never really feels that way. It almost never feels that way. I also think for me personally, and this is just, I'm totally riffing.

I've never thought about that. I mean, I've thought about it a little bit, but I think there's something to this idea that the game feels especially the new version ridiculously open-ended. Like it's basically Minecraft. I mean, the stuff that where you can build these like villages and you can like hook up power and do, I mean, I was like, at first I was like,

this is stupid, like I was wondering. I was wondering to ignore it. I was sort of mad. But then as soon as you start like seeing that there's, oh, you have these goals and you need to get people to put people to work and then you can get power going and then you can get houses lit up and you're like, oh, it actually looks kind of nice in this neighborhood now.

And you're like, wow, I'm building a community out in the wasteland. I think there is the vastness of it with all of those little story points to keep you moving. And it's like, you can play for hours and never touch a story or you can go straight through it. I think that has a lot to do with it. I think Far Cry is like that where it's like you can play for hours and never touch a story. Or you can go straight through it. I think that has a lot to do with it. I think Far Cry's like that.

Where it feels like it's very mind-crafty in that way, which is like you create your own narrative. Yeah. And I love that about it. I spent, I mean, I played Fallout 3, like religiously, and then beat it. And then save the game right before I beat it and would go and play like,

I would like wait to finish the game and do all these other things that I hadn't done, and beat it again. So I feel like also Fallout 3 had kind of an amazing story. I mean, I don't know if you remember. Fallout 3 was more immediately impressive. I don't know if you remember like, oh yeah, the thing with the AI, Yeah. And that shit was fucking cool. Yeah. And I do feel like Fallout 4 now has this thing with these Sims. Yeah. Which is, they're basically like Terminators. Yeah. They're like Terminator Zombies. Right. Which I'm like pretty psyched on. Sure. Yeah. Yeah.

I just think it's like, I just think it's like a well written, well directed game. But I also think that the openness of it is, I don't know, to me. The sound effects are great. I love the fucking cash register sound when you get XP. But that's exactly what I'm talking about. Those little details that make it, that give it more character. It's like games, most games are like, oh yeah, you've a gun, you're walking around,

you're shooting things, like it's true in Fallout, but there's so many other things that you can do. I remember the first time I played Fallout 3 and you go into this village, you remember the village that's like right outside the vault. Megaton. Megaton. And I killed a ton of people in Megaton.

You remember, you were like, you were like, you were like, you were like, you were like, you kill a kid and fall out through, there was a big controversy, you could kill children in it. And they like, took that out of the game. But yeah, like you like, you know, I went into this bar and the guy was like, you know, talking to the guy in the bar and then like, I was like, you know what, I'm just going to kill this guy. And it totally changes the game. Like, you know, talking to the guy in the bar and then like, I was like, you know what, I'm just gonna kill this guy. And it totally changes the game.

Yeah. Like, you become this like bad guy in the town. I mean, to me, that's like an amazing experience. Most games never give not that the game wants you to do, but the things that I think I would do in those situations. I try to play pretty true to myself. No, but I think what happened in Megaton is that I didn't fully understand when I first got the game what you could do. And I was going to kill this guy. And then I killed him and then it started this huge shoot out with other people.

And I had to kill them because they were shooting at me. Yeah. And then like I actually spent a lot of time trying to work my karma off because you get bad karma for that. They don't have that in this one, do they? Yeah, they do. Karma? I think so. Do they not?

I don't, I haven't seen it. No, I think they do. If they don't, I'm very disappointed. Yeah. You can still be a real piece of shit if you want to. Oh, I'm sure you can. Yeah. I'm sure.

But I'm playing. I'm going to be a good guy. I want to be, I want to be beloved in the way of slant. That's my, that's my goal. I'm so desperate for, for'm sure, but I'm playing. I'm gonna be a good guy. I wanna be, I wanna be beloved in the way you stand. That's my, that's my problem. I'm so desperate for affirmation and approval that I wanna fall out for. I want to like, my hope is that like I can, you know, settle down, establish a family, maybe, you know, get it.

Virtual Zelda. Maybe get like, get a virtual Zelda, maybe get like, I guess I'm kind of a business going, you know, somewhere. Like I know it's kind of, you know, making weapons for people, something. Yeah. I'm a little annoyed about the power arm or situation. The fact that they gave it to you

at the very beginning was, and like, if you look into the Fusion Core, it's like, dude, I'm like running out of power and then like a band in the suit. Well, did you play Fallout 1 or 2? No. So it was always like a really big deal to get the power arm.

And when you ran into it, you were like, holy shit, these people are invincible. Yeah, so I mean they totally reverse that Yeah, I haven't really you get it like towards the end of fall three. I remember that yeah, yeah, right exactly Yeah, I don't know if there's a choice, but you can become a member of the brotherhood of steel Yeah, they've already offered me that I'm like three hours a member hood of the memberhood of the brother I say manberhood I got what you're saying a member of the brotherhood of the brotherhood. Did I say memberhood? I got what you're saying. A member of the brotherhood of stills, what I meant. Maybe I didn't say that.

Listen, we need to wrap up, or well over the time that I thought we would spend on this podcast. I will talk about Fallout 4 with you for the next 12 hours. I think we'll be talking about it after we leave this room. But anyhow, Sam, this is great.

I actually, actually, I'm surprised. It's really good. I thought, you know, I wanted to have, I didn't get my hopes up. Look, the vacation's coming into this. Yeah, exactly. No, this is a lot of fun, and you have to come back. I would love to.

You come to the studio, we don't have to do it at remote. I like this bedroom setup. This is kind of nice. We're actually in, I'm not going to name names, but we're in the bedroom. Somebody's staying in this room who is a fairly well-known journalist. The floral print bed spread. Yeah, it's nice in here.

It's lovely I'm trying to think of I was trying to think of like one of these like columnists from like the 90s The very syndicated columnist. I'm like, oh fairly well-known journalist and I wanted to say like who's like a really well-known Really like miss manners? No, miss bad Landers or another like a guy who's the guy Dave Barry. Dave Barry. Actually Dave Barry stayed in this room Dave Barry's very true, but he's been pretty messy. Pretty messy guy actually. Alright Sam, thank you for doing this.

I really appreciate it. My pleasure. Alright well that's our podcast for this week. We'll be back next week with more tomorrow. And as always I wish you and your family the very best. Although it's gonna be tough to make it out there in the wasteland without power on them. you you