The Connect2 Podcast

Mark and Jeff go through the different types of espresso based coffee, discuss caffeine levels and review both the benefits (there are some benefits) and negatives of coffee.  Grab a cuppa and enjoy the discussion, we guarantee you will learn something new  

Mark and Jeff explore how to create something from essentially nothing.  How to make something creative from its raw form.  How did Leonardo Da Vinci create great statues from blocks of stone?

What is Cholesterol and what does it do?  Why do we need to manage it and what is the difference between HDL and LDL?  Statins are some of the most prescribed medications but can have some serious side effects....

Mark just finished a trip to Churchill Manitoba to photograph polar bears.  The results were amazing. In this episode, Mark discusses some of the details of his trip and things that make Churchill a special place 

OpenAI just released a new social media platform that consists entirely of AI generated slop.  It has some unusual features and is fun to use and experiment with.  Who knows where this will go but the ability to generate these short clips from text input is remarkable.

What prescription drugs have the most side effects and what are they?  What about generic drugs, are they just as effect as name brand drugs?  How well do they perform?  We explore both of these topics as well as discuss 3i/Atlas and what coffee we are drinking

Do you like to try new things?  Are you resistant to change?  Why are some people motivated to try new things while others resist change?  Mark and Jeff discuss this

Nasa is planning it's Artemis program to send astronauts to the moon and establish a base on the Moon to get us to Mars.  Today, we talk about the Artemis program, where it is at and where it is going

What happens when you have a humanoid robot and you put into it, AGI?  Where does that leave humanity?

In this episode Mark and Jeff discuss why older people talk about health concerns.

Mark and Jeff discuss Mark's recent trip to Katmai National Park in Alaska where he got to photograph Kodiak Brown Bears, some of the biggest bears in the world (basically the same size as polar bears)

Mark is on the road on a photography excursion to photography Kodiak bears in Katmai National Park.  On this travel edition of the podcast, Mark interviews a fellow photographer (Kayla Gordon from Winnipeg) and they discuss where they are and what they have been doing.  ****WARNING**** The noise quality is a little rough (the generator for the boat was going on in the background), we were in an op...

Have you seen lots of AI generated videos in your social media or Youtube?  Well, AI slop used to be easy to spot and low quality, but it is rapidly getting better.  It is also proliferating at an incredible rate.  Because of monetization policies of various social media platforms, AI slop is rapidly taking over.  It has the potential to completely overwhelm these social media platforms making the...

Drugs are an important treatment option for many mental health challenges, but our bodies adapt to the drugs and many of them lose their efficacy over time.  Mark and Jeff discuss the types of medications whose usefulness wanes with time and what they are used for.

After over 30 years of using windows machines including work managing IT for a two different companies, Mark finally decided to try to make the switch to Mac.  He is currently eating a large slice of humble pie and should have done this a while ago.  It has gone well.  Today's podcast discusses this and some earlier predictions from this podcast in 2020

Listening to music in the 80's and 90's, there are lots of favourite bands that had hits that we haven't heard from in years... Did they breakup?  Did they stop playing?  It turns out that there are many that have continued playing, releasing albums and touring.  Why don't we listen to them anymore?  

Everybody has heard that one in two marriages ends in divorce... well, that's not really true and has never been really true.  Currently divorce rates are at the lowest they have ever been.  So are marriages

Mark and Jeff discuss the different types of Killer Whales and the capture of the Pedder Bay Five (whales).

There is so much information about us in the world today.  There are many ways our data is collected and for many reasons.  Some are helpful but others are used to track our preferences and shopping patterns.  Some governments intentionally track their citizens.  In this episode, we discuss how to protect yourself in this hyper connected world

In this episode, Mark and Jeff discuss Robot Vacuums (and mops) and this is a followup to a previous episode where we talked about how Roomba the company was in financial trouble.  This episode, we talk more about the new up an comers and what differentiates the good robot vacuums from the also rans

What are the pros and cons of renewable energy?  Sometimes in this politically fractured environment, people have talking points about renewable energy that has little to do with reality.  Mark and Jeff discuss the actual pros and actual cons of both Solar and Wind Power and compare them in general terms to other forms of energy.

Forever chemicals are manmade chemicals that are related to the production of teflon related products.  They don't breakdown and can be found everywhere on the planet and in particular are an issue with drinking water.  Certain variants are toxic to humans and in many places of the world the levels found in our drinking water is dangerous to humans.  Mark and Jeff explore this topic.

Some people have a very hard time recognizing faces.  This is a problem in many social interactions and environments.  Similarly, there are people who are Super recognizers and can recall faces of people that they only saw briefly even years previously.  In this episode, Mark and Jeff discuss a number of stunning facts surrounding this condition

Neuroplasticity is the ability of your brain to rewire itself either by learning new skills or as a result of recovering from injury.  You can learn skills even as you get older but there are some things you can do to help keep your brain sharp.  We review 8 things that can help your brain

China was having some challenges prior to the tariffs introduced by the US.  This has made them more vulnerable to the impact of these tariffs but not for normal reasons.  Mark and Jeff discuss some of the infrastructure issues that have presented China with challenges as they have grown and developed into a manufacturing superpower.