Speaker 1: From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
Speaker 1: riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
Speaker 1: learn this stuff they don't want you to know. A
Speaker 1: production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: Hello, welcome back to the show. My name is Matt.
Speaker 2: Our colleague NOL will be right back, and.
Speaker 3: He will no doubt return with some awesome adventure stories.
Speaker 3: We look forward to them. They call me Ben. We
Speaker 3: are joined as always with our super producer Alexis codename
Speaker 3: Doc Holliday Jackson. Most importantly, you are you. You are
Speaker 3: here That makes this the stuff they don't want you
Speaker 3: to know. It is Thursday if you're hearing this when
Speaker 3: it comes out, which means long time conspiracy realist. This
Speaker 3: is our moment for messages from you, Matt, Doc and
Speaker 3: I are gonna play it a little bit shoot from
Speaker 3: the hip, fast and loose. Today we thought we would
Speaker 3: dive into a couple of emails, couple of letters from home,
Speaker 3: a couple of voicemails, and let's see Matt before we
Speaker 3: get going, just checking in, how's everything on your end?
Speaker 3: No poop balloons from the neighbors, hopefully No.
Speaker 2: I did this fun thing though. I'm going to tell
Speaker 2: you about it right now. Has nothing to do with
Speaker 2: the show. Congratulations. Here's the story from Matt's life. My
Speaker 2: son and I got one of these water slide things.
Speaker 2: It's not a water slide when you think about one,
Speaker 2: if you go to Whitewater or one of these parks, right,
Speaker 2: it's a slipping slide. That's a reference that kids from
Speaker 2: the eighties and nineties would probably get. Well, we got
Speaker 2: one of those things, set it up in the old
Speaker 2: front yard there, set it off, and spent two days
Speaker 2: just going to town on it. Was amazing. And in
Speaker 2: between those two days there was a thunderstorm, so there
Speaker 2: was a lot of ground moisture on top of all
Speaker 2: the water that this slip and slide thing was already.
Speaker 2: You connect a hose up to it and it sprays
Speaker 2: water on itself to keep it all I guess, lubricated,
Speaker 2: so you can slide down it. Well, what I didn't
Speaker 2: realize is that my old big body is not like
Speaker 2: a kid going down a slip and slide anymore. And
Speaker 2: when the weight of my body impacts the ground, it
Speaker 2: pushes all of that mud that's being generated out of
Speaker 2: the way. So basically, my son and I had a
Speaker 2: great time on Memorial Day and ruined my front lawn.
Speaker 2: There's a story from Matt's life. How's the lawn doing destroyed? Currently?
Speaker 2: You do anything fun for a Memorial Day or any
Speaker 2: anything interesting?
Speaker 3: I've been with me the whole time. I'm not sure
Speaker 3: what would interest other folks. You know what I mean.
Speaker 2: I do not know what you mean. You're a fascinating individual.
Speaker 3: That's very kind. We've got some got some cool fiction
Speaker 3: coming out, hopefully, We've got some stories that are very
Speaker 3: true that may show up, and stuff they don't want
Speaker 3: you to know, presents and like you, Like many people
Speaker 3: in this part of the Global Woods, I also witnessed
Speaker 3: with great awe and astonishment the storms that rolled in.
Speaker 3: Who's our buddy? Who always says the fog rolls in?
Speaker 2: Viking?
Speaker 3: Viking? Yeah, shout out to you. Viking thought of you.
Speaker 3: When the rains came through, it's usually it's always the fog,
Speaker 3: the fog rules. We have received so much fascinating correspondence.
Speaker 3: Matt Dock thought it would be interesting to learn about
Speaker 3: something that I had never heard of before. And perhaps
Speaker 3: you have, perhaps you're read onto it, man, But I
Speaker 3: had never heard of something called the Atlas Network. You
Speaker 3: heard of this.
Speaker 2: What is that? I know Atlas games and that's it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I know Atlas, the big BattleMech you know, I
Speaker 3: know Atlas the mythological figure. Right. But to answer this
Speaker 3: question we have to go to Concerned Kiwi. Concerned Kiwi
Speaker 3: writes in and says the following, Hey, guys, longtime listener,
Speaker 3: love the show. I was wondering if you, gentlemen could
Speaker 3: take a deep dive into the Atlas Network. They're the
Speaker 3: head of an international far right network of five hundred
Speaker 3: plus think tanks and lobby groups that manipulate democracies globally.
Speaker 3: They're known as the think tank that creates think tanks.
Speaker 3: They have links back to the Koch Brothers, Philip Morris, Tobacco,
Speaker 3: an ex On Mobile, to name but a few. They're
Speaker 3: extremely active in my country, New Zealand, which isn't that
Speaker 3: surprising since New Zealand is often used a as a
Speaker 3: political testing ground by foreign bad actors. Since this is
Speaker 3: a bit of an in depth piece of correspondence off air,
Speaker 3: we decided we would round robinet. It's quite a tale.
Speaker 2: The Atlas Network are associated with numerous lobby groups and
Speaker 2: businesses here, including the taxpayers Union.
Speaker 3: I'm assuming super innocuous name.
Speaker 2: I think that's what it is. It says taypayers, but
Speaker 2: I think it's taxes and most concerningly, the New Zealand Initiative,
Speaker 2: which reads like a who's who of prominent New Zealand
Speaker 2: businesses and business elites. They've also groomed and supported David Seymour,
Speaker 2: leader of our local libertarian party Act ACT, who regularly
Speaker 2: and currently share power in government. But you can't ask
Speaker 2: Seymour any questions about the Atlas Network or he'll call
Speaker 2: you a conspiracy theorist, even even though he worked for
Speaker 2: Atlas members in his youth. Was photographed during an Atlas
Speaker 2: Network event and called the Atlas Network quote old friends
Speaker 2: in a speech that can be found on his own
Speaker 2: party's website. The Atlas Network is also prevalent in Australia,
Speaker 2: Germany and other countries around the world. Sounds like five
Speaker 2: eyes to me, Come on, guys, what's going on? And
Speaker 2: it concludes in this paragraph, I'm not aware of their
Speaker 2: activities in the US.
Speaker 3: So apparently neither were we concerned. Kiwi. The missive continues
Speaker 3: the Atlas Network and their associated organizations attempt to feign
Speaker 3: political neutrality, but as their name would suggest, they support
Speaker 3: the tired old libertarian ideas of small government, big business,
Speaker 3: free markets, market solutions of widespread the regulation. I don't
Speaker 3: know why I'm doing that voice. That voice is editorial anyway,
Speaker 3: continues so as you'd expect, they consistently prioritize corporate interest
Speaker 3: over public welfare. The at list network supports, trains, consults,
Speaker 3: and sometimes directly funds their member groups and allegedly manipulate
Speaker 3: some political parties directly act, projecting undue influence on local
Speaker 3: politics and interfering with the policy making process.
Speaker 2: Boy, everybody loves a lobbying group. Let's go on to
Speaker 2: the next paragraph. They sometimes coordinate overarching strategies designed to
Speaker 2: influence the public vote, often preying on fear in division
Speaker 2: dog whistling about populist issues, most notably around issues pertaining
Speaker 2: to indigenous rights. Interesting In New Zealand, their local mouthpieces
Speaker 2: took part in a fear mongering campaign against various proposed
Speaker 2: policies that would have benefited Maori. In Australia, there's evidence
Speaker 2: they helped organize a widespread disinfo campaign to manipulate the
Speaker 2: public into voting against the Voice Australia, which is an
Speaker 2: initiative designed to give Aborigines an increased political presence in Germany.
Speaker 2: There are claims they were involved in the criminalizing of
Speaker 2: climate protesters.
Speaker 3: So much for freedom.
Speaker 2: In Africa, they've been criticized for their alleged support of
Speaker 2: authoritarian regimes.
Speaker 3: Alleged nice one. Concerned Kiwi continues, the global influence of
Speaker 3: the Atlass network seems pretty pervasive to say the least,
Speaker 3: yet we never hear much about them. It would be
Speaker 3: great if you guys could help change that. It seems
Speaker 3: to me that the Atlass Network, with their level of
Speaker 3: undue power and influence, is definitely not something that should
Speaker 3: be met with a shrug. And here Concerned Kiwi provides
Speaker 3: several fantastic links. Like we always say in the email,
Speaker 3: take us to the edge of the rabbit hole, will
Speaker 3: do the rest, and says concludes with thanks for consistently
Speaker 3: holding power to account. Concerned, Kiwi and Matt did a
Speaker 3: little bit of digging here first off, thanks to ck
Speaker 3: on this one. The Atlas Network is definitely a real thing,
Speaker 3: possibly a future episode in my opinion. It was formerly
Speaker 3: known as the Atlas Economic Research Foundation and it's been
Speaker 3: around for a while. It was created in nineteen eighty one,
Speaker 3: but oh by a guy who's called the quote Johnny
Speaker 3: Appleseed of anti regulation groups. What a nerd street name.
Speaker 2: What a horrible idea.
Speaker 3: It's also is it based on Atlas Shrugged? It's it
Speaker 3: leads us to a fascinating and perhaps disturbing conversation because,
Speaker 3: as Kiwi points out as concerned, Kiwi rightly notes, this
Speaker 3: is an incubator for other think tanks. And just like
Speaker 3: walking through a grocery store, buy in different flavors of cereal,
Speaker 3: if you are not careful, you won't know that they
Speaker 3: are associated together. I learned about another thing called the
Speaker 3: State Policy Network, which is across It's like Alec again. Man,
Speaker 3: I just doc if you could please beat me here.
Speaker 3: The conspiracy is real. It seems there is Korea foot Yeah.
Speaker 2: Might I read from mister Anthony Fisher's little bio here
Speaker 2: on atlasnetwork dot org.
Speaker 3: Oh please please please.
Speaker 2: This is under the heading our creation story. Now you
Speaker 2: got to get through this first part in order to
Speaker 2: really feel the impact of the second paragraph. Here we go.
Speaker 3: Take us there, let's get in the moment.
Speaker 2: Atlas Network's founder, Anthony Fisher knew what it meant to
Speaker 2: find your own place in the world. After his father
Speaker 2: was killed in the First World War when Antony was
Speaker 2: only two yearsyears old, he went on to serve as
Speaker 2: a pilot in the Royal Air Force in World War Two.
Speaker 2: Seeing Britain embrace a socialist economic agenda. At the end
Speaker 2: of the war, Antony was dismayed by the subdivision of
Speaker 2: individual enterprise in service of a government led centralized policy.
Speaker 2: He came across an abridged edition of Fa hayex The
Speaker 2: Road to Serfdom, which proposes that central planning inevitably erodes
Speaker 2: individual liberty and enables tyranny. Hayek's philosophy not only influenced
Speaker 2: Fisher's own career trajectory, but also inspired him to think
Speaker 2: a ways to drive grassroots level change that promoted free
Speaker 2: market opportunities.
Speaker 3: All right, So also for context here before we moved
Speaker 3: to the second paragraph where things get really juicy. Frederick
Speaker 3: Ayek is an old school Austrian economist. He's thought to
Speaker 3: be a member of a leading luminary of what we
Speaker 3: call the Austrian school. And I would say that they
Speaker 3: got treated as gurus rather than as social scientists. So
Speaker 3: I'd say there's a lot of ideology at play here.
Speaker 2: Yeah, dude. Apparently he went to the United States in
Speaker 2: nineteen eighty one and established the thing that became Atlas Network,
Speaker 2: and it calls it a process. What the Atlas Network
Speaker 2: does is in institute a process that helps think tanks quote,
Speaker 2: unshackle the power of individual liberty and enterprise. Yeah that
Speaker 2: sounds great, man, it sure does. And they partner with
Speaker 2: almost five hundred think tanks in over one hundred countries
Speaker 2: that drive change in ideas, culture, and policy, remove barriers
Speaker 2: to opportunities, and empower individuals to live a life of choice.
Speaker 3: Do you know why I stopped you, young man? Well, officer,
Speaker 3: I guess we're both removing barriers to opportunity.
Speaker 2: Well, yeah, we're both just living lifes of choice man.
Speaker 3: Yeah. So, Also, Fisher is fascinating because in nineteen fifty
Speaker 3: two he went to the US for the first time
Speaker 3: and he visited a thing called the Foundation for Economic Education.
Speaker 3: So this guy, the progenitor of Atlas Networks, has been
Speaker 3: ten toes down for quite a while. He made his
Speaker 3: money off chicken farms. True story. He started England's first
Speaker 3: battery chicken farm. This is coming from source Watch, which
Speaker 3: is a fantastic, if imperfect resource for a lot of this,
Speaker 3: a lot of this larger context. And like you said, Matt,
Speaker 3: he keeps going back and forth with the US and
Speaker 3: with these various somewhat ephemeral institutions, these incubators of ideological thought.
Speaker 3: It was through this thing called the Atlas network. Now,
Speaker 3: it was through that that he was able to extend
Speaker 3: his beliefs worldwide. Remove the barriers, we suppose, remove the
Speaker 3: barriers and allow people the opportunity to hear him say
Speaker 3: his opinions as though those opinions were facts. And we
Speaker 3: see that, We see that this guy was not just
Speaker 3: instrumental in the creation of this specific species of think tank,
Speaker 3: but indeed instrumental in the concept of think tanks overall.
Speaker 3: And you know, we've talked about this off air time
Speaker 3: or two, but if the dice had rolled slightly differently,
Speaker 3: your faithful correspondence may well have been in think tanks
Speaker 3: now instead of doing our little show.
Speaker 2: Oh not me. They would never let me in one
Speaker 2: of those.
Speaker 3: Yet, no, they would get it. They would want you.
Speaker 2: They'd be like, you have to think in here, Frederick,
Speaker 2: and I'd be like.
Speaker 3: I'd make it a condition for hiring me, I'd be like, no.
Speaker 2: They've got a what do they call this a style? No,
Speaker 2: a unique approach? I guess uh, it's their strategic model.
Speaker 2: Coach compete celebrate trademark.
Speaker 3: That is the weirdest in olive garden I have ever
Speaker 3: heard of.
Speaker 2: You coach others, then you compete out there on the
Speaker 2: grid iron, and when you're done, you throw that gatorade
Speaker 2: on your coach.
Speaker 3: And now like, what what is the complex acronym for celebrate? Right,
Speaker 3: everybody tell us what celebrate really means. We also want
Speaker 3: to shout out one last thing about Fisher, a little
Speaker 3: known story. He is a failed turtle farmer. Oh yeah,
Speaker 3: So if you want to be fun at parties, especially
Speaker 3: at an Atlas Network sponsored soiree, ask them about the
Speaker 3: turtle far man. I don't know. It's an episode of
Speaker 3: the future. Though we still have to do Project twenty
Speaker 3: twenty five.
Speaker 2: Oh man, I can't wait for that one. He said again. Ai,
Speaker 2: I said it sarcastically.
Speaker 3: Again, sarcastically in any language. And with that, we're going
Speaker 3: to pause for a word from our sponsors, and we'll
Speaker 3: be back with more messages from our fellow listeners.
Speaker 2: And we've returned and we're jumping into yie old phone lines.
Speaker 2: We got a message recently from fun Crusher. Uh oh boy,
Speaker 2: we're in for it. Let's see what fun Crusher has
Speaker 2: to say.
Speaker 4: Hey, gang, you can call me fun Crusher. This is
Speaker 4: something that might lead to an episode, or it might
Speaker 4: just be a segment. I don't know because I haven't
Speaker 4: really looked into it. But here in beautiful Austin, Texas,
Speaker 4: there was recently, within the last year, I want to say,
Speaker 4: maybe two years, the series of deaths that were like
Speaker 4: all kind of like young professional men who drowned in
Speaker 4: Town Lake, which is our little section of.
Speaker 3: The Colorado River.
Speaker 4: And the conspiracy is that these deaths were actually the
Speaker 4: work of a serial killer and that the city, for
Speaker 4: whatever reason, is calling them accidental. They all happened in
Speaker 4: the same kind of section of downtown Austin where there's
Speaker 4: like a lot of nightlife, and the theory that these
Speaker 4: guys are being drugged and then chuffed into the drink
Speaker 4: by the supposed killer. Now again, this is all hearsay,
Speaker 4: This is all rumor, This is all just word on
Speaker 4: the street. This is my girlfriend's uber drivers brother cousin
Speaker 4: I don't know was a victim. This is just I
Speaker 4: haven't lookeden to it at all. I'm leading that up
Speaker 4: to you guys if you want to so. But ask
Speaker 4: pretty much anyone around Austin if they've heard of the
Speaker 4: Rainy Street Ripper, and most people have heard something or
Speaker 4: other about it, So maybe something to look into. Thanks
Speaker 4: for everything, I'll do, peace.
Speaker 3: Fun Crusher. Indeed, thank you so much for taking the
Speaker 3: time to call in. Sir Matt. Initial reactions would be this,
Speaker 3: this reminds me a little bit of the smiley face theories.
Speaker 3: Real lost.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I just want to check we haven't covered this right,
Speaker 2: this specifically.
Speaker 3: Not cover the Rainy Street Ripper allegations.
Speaker 2: Okay, again, it does sound so familiar to that those
Speaker 2: other cases, and I know people have called in before
Speaker 2: about other towns where there's been a killer. I think
Speaker 2: somebody did mention Austin specifically as like a place where
Speaker 2: there were potentially some bodies being found. Because this has
Speaker 2: been going on for over twenty two twenty three months now,
Speaker 2: I've gotten an article up here. There's one thing just
Speaker 2: to point out here, fun Crusher, you said town Lake,
Speaker 2: and maybe that's what it's called where you are, or
Speaker 2: what's Lady Lake. Yeah, Ladybird Lake is what I'm seeing
Speaker 2: in all the reporting, and they're reporting for twenty two months.
Speaker 2: Since July twenty twenty two, there have been twelve bodies,
Speaker 2: at least twelve bodies that have been recovered from this
Speaker 2: central Texas lake and in the immediately surrounding area land
Speaker 2: around the lake. This is nuts. Several were found in
Speaker 2: April twenty twenty four, and it dates all the way
Speaker 2: back to July twenty twenty two. You can find a
Speaker 2: list of names of these of the twelve people who
Speaker 2: the bodies have been recovered. Each one is a separate
Speaker 2: story that we would have to look into, I think,
Speaker 2: for a larger episode if we wanted to really do this.
Speaker 2: It is very, very odd. People are reporting on it everywhere.
Speaker 2: Apparently the public in the area a lot like yourself
Speaker 2: and people around you fun crusher. They're nervous about. It
Speaker 2: doesn't feel good when that many bodies are being recovered
Speaker 2: in a lake right by you. The theories, as you stated,
Speaker 2: possible serial killer or a group of people who are
Speaker 2: you know, maybe robbing people like we did in that
Speaker 2: story in Atlanta recently, or in New York where individuals
Speaker 2: going out for drinks, were getting drugged and robbed and
Speaker 2: sometimes killed. Maybe there's something like that happening. It's really scary.
Speaker 2: There's one story from Fox Evan Austin that is detailing
Speaker 2: a specific family of one of the victims saying, hey, authorities, police,
Speaker 2: we need you to look into these various hypotheses, the theories
Speaker 2: that are coming up to put an end to this,
Speaker 2: because this is unacceptable and we are not only scared,
Speaker 2: we want to know what the heck happened.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and for anyone unfamiliar the idea of the smiley
Speaker 3: face murder theory, which I think both of us instantly
Speaker 3: thought of this we heard this story. The smiley face
Speaker 3: murder theory is the idea that in certain parts of
Speaker 3: the United States, multiple deaths of young men that have
Speaker 3: been recorded or reported as drownings are indeed the result
Speaker 3: of homicide, possibly due to the predation of a serial
Speaker 3: killer or group of murderers. We can say at the
Speaker 3: very beginning that it is quite rare for the things
Speaker 3: that we call serial killers, which I do not consider people.
Speaker 3: It is quite rare for those entities to cooperate. They're
Speaker 3: a bit egoistic in that regard in terms of Ladybird
Speaker 3: Lake and the idea of the Rainy Street ripper. You
Speaker 3: can find stuff. You can find statements from the Austin
Speaker 3: Police Department. This is active investigation. You can find any
Speaker 3: number of locals who are talking with great concern about
Speaker 3: what exactly has happened to these innocent people. Now, obviously,
Speaker 3: let's get it out of the way. It is completely
Speaker 3: possible for somebody to fall into a body of water,
Speaker 3: you know, a lake, a river and ocean whatever, and
Speaker 3: to die, right, it is entirely possible for those deaths
Speaker 3: to occur accident. The question here is whether there is
Speaker 3: someone actively committing homicides. And you can go to any
Speaker 3: number of outlets now, especially in the past. Honestly, in
Speaker 3: the past few months, I'm seeing stuff from February twenty
Speaker 3: twenty four. I'm seeing things from a few years earlier,
Speaker 3: just a month ago. The Daily Mail surely the stellar
Speaker 3: reporting source in all of the United Kingdom. I'm kidding.
Speaker 3: If there is a language translation app currently deployed, please
Speaker 3: note I said that sarcastically. You can see you can
Speaker 3: see maps of people who have disappeared most recently, like
Speaker 3: dating back to twenty twenty two, So several years, but
Speaker 3: also the scuttle butt says far before then, and we
Speaker 3: spent time in Austin, Matt, We've had boots on the ground.
Speaker 2: Well on Rainey's this is where south By occurs. We
Speaker 2: ate at the ihop that's right at the end of
Speaker 2: Rainy Street in Driscoll. Like, yes, we are highly aware
Speaker 2: of this, and I'm looking for Lady Bird Lake just
Speaker 2: to make sure I understand, like how far that is
Speaker 2: away from here? And it is. It's basically the Colorado
Speaker 2: River that has been dammed up just a little bit,
Speaker 2: I guess, or stopped somewhere down north Pleasant Valley Road.
Speaker 2: It looks like I mean, it's right there by Rainy Street.
Speaker 2: You could basically follow Rainy Street near down to the
Speaker 2: Rainy Dumpster Rental Austin and you could be in that
Speaker 2: at least that part of the Colorado River that then
Speaker 2: dumps into the lake.
Speaker 3: So going back to now that we have the benefit
Speaker 3: of the map, what we could see is there is
Speaker 3: a stretch of Colorado River right that has clear become
Speaker 3: a big part of Austin. Right. It's the place where
Speaker 3: the tourists go. And if you look at this map
Speaker 3: from again, I'm going to go back to the Daily
Speaker 3: Mail here. If you look at this map in the reporting,
Speaker 3: what you can see is a clear note of the
Speaker 3: identity of people who have died, the time or the
Speaker 3: day their body was found, and the address of where
Speaker 3: the body was discovered. And so we'll get back to
Speaker 3: this one at the end. But they're clearly I don't
Speaker 3: want to say immediately that there's a murderer about that's
Speaker 3: targeting people, but there are clearly people dying along this
Speaker 3: stretch of river.
Speaker 2: Right, That's correct. If you want to look more into this,
Speaker 2: there's apparently a bartender somewhere in Austin that claims they
Speaker 2: have spoken with this quote Rainy Street Killer's again, it's
Speaker 2: like a social post. Who knows if it's real or not.
Speaker 2: Hopefully it's being fully investigated, but we're going to keep
Speaker 2: an eye on this and it might be worth our
Speaker 2: time to go through some of this in a deeper way.
Speaker 2: So thank you so much fun Crusher for crushing the
Speaker 2: fun and that voicemail. We'll be right back with more
Speaker 2: messages from you.
Speaker 3: And we have returned another piece of correspondence. Before we
Speaker 3: get to some letters from home, we're going to hear
Speaker 3: from a little bit Space, who says the following, Hi, guys,
Speaker 3: I just finished our episode on online pornography, very dark stuff,
Speaker 3: little bit Space. We agree, but says little bit Space,
Speaker 3: that's not why I'm emailing you. At the beginning of
Speaker 3: the episode, you mentioned aski art and described it it
Speaker 3: as a block of text characters usually shared on meme
Speaker 3: and text forums. Specifically mentioned spacing, but spacing is not
Speaker 3: typically fiddled with. Aski art is most commonly drawn using
Speaker 3: a monospaced font, although gatekeepers want to dictate which fonts
Speaker 3: are allowed. It's a long story the way you speak
Speaker 3: about it, and then we're gonna paraphrase this part little Space,
Speaker 3: as we basically need to.
Speaker 2: Learn more about the art and the scene the.
Speaker 3: Art and the scene, and little Space continues.
Speaker 2: I'm not the best person to educate you on this topic,
Speaker 2: but I know the basics. First, aski art is one
Speaker 2: of the main genres of text mode arts, and under
Speaker 2: aski art goes lots of different subgenres, usually restricted to
Speaker 2: a specific retro computing system such as Commodore sixty four
Speaker 2: or Amstrad. Yes, we are aware of the Commodore sixty four.
Speaker 2: Asking this is very cool. Secondly, you should draw a
Speaker 2: line between ASKI and ASKI art, as they are very
Speaker 2: disc from each other. I happen to be an artist
Speaker 2: working on this very medium and see lots of ASKI
Speaker 2: people call art. The subgenres I work in typically are
Speaker 2: modern ASCI font choice not restricted to hardware fonts and
Speaker 2: with not limited to eighty. Haters will hate pet Ski
Speaker 2: the Commodore sixty four ASKI so to speak, and custom
Speaker 2: pet Ski with a custom eight bit font. Okay, Anyhow,
Speaker 2: text mode arts is a scene that's alive and kicking,
Speaker 2: and you can make real art using ASKI, not just
Speaker 2: some meme forum content.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and I think there's a solid point there. One
Speaker 3: cannot dictate the medium of art, right, So little Bitspace
Speaker 3: ends with you can find me with the handle little
Speaker 3: bit Space, and they have any number of ways to
Speaker 3: get in touch with them. They want to be easy
Speaker 3: to find online. We thought that was an interesting point
Speaker 3: because as Ski holds a great deal of nostalgia for
Speaker 3: many of us in the crowd. It reminds me a
Speaker 3: little bit, Matt of the fantastic work I hope this
Speaker 3: is not a hot take, but the fantastic work I've
Speaker 3: seen with Lego bricks, you know when people make phenomenal
Speaker 3: sculptures using lego, So we really appreciate your time, little
Speaker 3: bit space. We also we also want to hear and
Speaker 3: see and witness the works of art that you have created,
Speaker 3: fellow conspiracy realists, so please do send those to us.
Speaker 3: Email us, drop us ald on the internet, give us
Speaker 3: a call. We'll tell you how to find us at
Speaker 3: the end. But we thought that we thought that for
Speaker 3: this evening we might wrap up with a little bit
Speaker 3: of a letter from home from our pal Wayne. We
Speaker 3: all remember Wayne.
Speaker 2: Oh Wayne, former security guard, magic gay, enthusiastic mary.
Speaker 3: Guy, classic Wayne. Let's that jinx Wayne.
Speaker 2: I don't know if you're married or if you're just
Speaker 2: a fiancee. IM not sure you're talking to Wayne betrothed. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I'm not. I'm not sure.
Speaker 3: So everybody else please listen in. This is a nice
Speaker 3: little letter from home we got from our pal Wayne.
Speaker 5: They don't want you to know this stuff. They don't
Speaker 5: want you to stand which I want to apologize to
Speaker 5: Ben even though Matt's probably hearing this one. But then
Speaker 5: if you're listening to this guy, I always assume Matt's
Speaker 5: the one listen, so I always kind of had him
Speaker 5: as my audience, but you probably listen to all my
Speaker 5: college You're like, who the heck is this guy? Thinking
Speaker 5: that all the Matt listens and just hung up immediately,
Speaker 5: which I wouldn't blame. But if indeed Ben is listening
Speaker 5: to this, yeah, please, I accept my apology. Second, I'm
Speaker 5: listening to the Scholar episode. Skull means the drug one,
Speaker 5: the one that makes you susceptible if you were to
Speaker 5: hit yourself with scull, I mean in a defensive act
Speaker 5: to say that you were on schol. I mean, couldn't
Speaker 5: they just ask you if you did that and you'd
Speaker 5: be compliant? But yeah with me, Yeah, like if it
Speaker 5: makes you susceptible to persuasion, I mean, I don't know
Speaker 5: if it also tells you the truth or it makes
Speaker 5: you tell the truth, But I don't know. It just
Speaker 5: seems like there might be some holes in this in
Speaker 5: this defensive place. Either way, have a leveling time. I
Speaker 5: have a good one, guys.
Speaker 3: Oh, but no apologies necessary. We're just glad that you
Speaker 3: made it, like everybody else, hoping you have safe travels
Speaker 3: and may it What a good reminder, What a nice
Speaker 3: hold shower refresher on our earlier joke about whether or
Speaker 3: not you could drug yourself to get out of awkward
Speaker 3: social situations, right because they would ask, you know, did
Speaker 3: you do detrah it you can be like, yeah, maybe
Speaker 3: I guess.
Speaker 2: Did you hit your yourself in the noggin? Yep?
Speaker 3: So that's our friendly reminder not to drug yourself to
Speaker 3: get out of unpleasant conversations. If the police come knocking,
Speaker 3: or if the IF at LISS network send some folks
Speaker 3: to your door, you can't say, hold on a moment,
Speaker 3: let me take this amnesiac serum or whatever, which I
Speaker 3: don't know whether that's the thing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Like that brings you right back, so you get
Speaker 2: your memories all back.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I don't know. It's weird because many years ago
Speaker 3: I was in a situation I thought, you know, there's
Speaker 3: an insidious product you could sell. A lot of people,
Speaker 3: especially in the West, seem to sit through parts of
Speaker 3: their life, parts of their day to day life, just
Speaker 3: get a participation grade, you know what I mean. You
Speaker 3: gotta wait in line, or you gotta sit around and
Speaker 3: have a meeting where people are going to say all
Speaker 3: the same stuff they've told you before. I wondered whether
Speaker 3: people would buy some kind of product or service that
Speaker 3: let you just do that participation grade that freed you
Speaker 3: up to check all the boxes and a social interaction,
Speaker 3: but put your mind somewhere else, like automating your physical presence.
Speaker 3: I think it would work. I also think it's evil.
Speaker 3: I don't know what are your thoughts.
Speaker 2: No thanks, I want to be in the moment with
Speaker 2: people I'm around, Ben, I think that would be lovely.
Speaker 2: I'm usually stuck in my own head doing the other thing.
Speaker 2: When I'm I'm doing what you're describing. So I've already
Speaker 2: given myself this dang whatever it is that we're thinking
Speaker 2: about here, and I wish I could be more present,
Speaker 2: present in the moment. Yeah, just like this moment now
Speaker 2: because I'm over here looking up sandwiches in Chicago something
Speaker 2: called the gym shoe, just because I wanted to make
Speaker 2: a note about Wayne's moniker. He uses stuff in I
Speaker 2: want you to sand sandwich. Dang.
Speaker 3: Well, that's why we get letters from home. It's a
Speaker 3: good check in, folks. If you are having those difficult, strange,
Speaker 3: awkward conversations, it is better to be in the moment.
Speaker 3: I am. I guess I'm what they would call happy
Speaker 3: to have, not sold some sort of evil product or
Speaker 3: service that lets people escape those moments that gives you
Speaker 3: that participation grade.
Speaker 2: They're called a cell phone, by the way.
Speaker 3: Although, funny story, there was a company, I think in
Speaker 3: South Korea for a few years where if you had
Speaker 3: to fire someone, or you had to quit your job,
Speaker 3: or you had to break up with a romantic partner,
Speaker 3: you could call this company and they would send someone
Speaker 3: to do it for you.
Speaker 2: That's a sketch, right, I've seen that.
Speaker 3: It was a real service for a minute, but I
Speaker 3: think it's kind of evil, you know what I mean.
Speaker 3: That's somehow worse than breaking up with some one via text.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Hi, we've never met, but you know Claudia right, well,
Speaker 3: she's done. Anyway, it's a pleasure to meet you.
Speaker 2: Here's the five dollars she owed you.
Speaker 3: Here's the five dollars she owed you.
Speaker 2: Your stuff's outside your apartment.
Speaker 3: Her stuff is outside your apartment. I guess the last
Speaker 3: thing we say is we got We asked for some
Speaker 3: funniest reptile pictures, and we got a bunch of them, Matt.
Speaker 3: My favorite is probably from our pal Darcy.
Speaker 2: Darcy sent us a picture of what appears to be
Speaker 2: the actor Marty Friedman. Though I may be wrong, Darcy,
Speaker 2: I'm not sure. It looks as though it's a picture
Speaker 2: of Marty Friedman in a film that I cannot identify,
Speaker 2: though I probably should be able to.
Speaker 3: So we've confirmed at least that the guy's not a
Speaker 3: the guy is not a reptile technically or no, where
Speaker 3: are we with this one?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't think he's a reptile, but I think
Speaker 2: it's a play on Often if you see a social
Speaker 2: media post and say, hey, reptile reptilian confirmed, it has
Speaker 2: something to do with the eyes or the eyes are
Speaker 2: not circular, they've got the slit, kind of like a
Speaker 2: cat or like a reptile. But in this case, it's
Speaker 2: just eyes that are clearly not going in the same direction,
Speaker 2: let's say in bulging Yeah.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 3: We've been getting a lot of feedback on our reptilian
Speaker 3: reptilian conspiracy episode, and one of the things that gave
Speaker 3: me my version of endless delight was how many people
Speaker 3: wrote to us and said, Hey, the following insert celebrity
Speaker 3: here describes themselves as a reptile, which is interesting. But
Speaker 3: also I have not found a case of a celebrity
Speaker 3: claiming to be a reptilian and also getting any kind
Speaker 3: of medical to confirm that. I think maybe, and not
Speaker 3: to sound like a jerk, I think maybe they're saying
Speaker 3: it for attention. Oh dear, I know that's that's our
Speaker 3: hot shot. Iess boom boom, And we have so much
Speaker 3: more to follow up on. We're gonna call it an
Speaker 3: evening for now and get back to some crazy work
Speaker 3: that we hope you enjoy in the future. We have
Speaker 3: a long conversation ahead of us, perhaps about Job's daughters,
Speaker 3: a lot of responses to that, mysterious holes, reptilian conspiracies,
Speaker 3: and much much more. We can't wait for you to
Speaker 3: join us on the journey. We try to be easy
Speaker 3: to find online Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, twitterx, dot com, et cetera,
Speaker 3: all the hits, or just you know, go to your
Speaker 3: favorite crossroads at midnight say the right words, we'll find you.
Speaker 3: You can also call us on the phone.
Speaker 2: Yes, our number is one eight three three st d
Speaker 2: w y TK. When you call in, give yourself a
Speaker 2: cool nickname and let us know if we can use
Speaker 2: your name and message on the air. If you've got
Speaker 2: more to say than can fit in that couple of minutes.
Speaker 2: Why not instead send us a good old fashioned email.
Speaker 3: We are the entities that read every single email we get.
Speaker 3: It makes our evening when you specifically you write to us.
Speaker 3: Give us the links, give us the photos. Share the
Speaker 3: funniest reptile you've seen. We can't wait to read it all.
Speaker 3: Be well aware. Sometimes the void writes back conspiracy at
Speaker 3: iHeartRadio dot com.
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