The Connect2 Podcast

Mark was travelling this week but managed to set up an interview with Sarah DeRemer a dog photographer based out of LA who is also known as dogtographer.la on Instagram.  She's an amazing photographer who took the time to sit down with Mark and talk about her photography and her first visit to the Canadian Rockies.

There are polls on just about everything, but how do they work?  Why are they correct a certain percentage, 19 times out of 20?  What does that mean? Mark and Jeff discuss the foundation of polls and the problems with how polling is conducted.  With elections all over the place, what do the polls mean in relation to the elections being conducted?  Can we rely upon them?

Mark and Jeff, after episodes exploring different types of AI ask the question, what makes an AI work?  When will a computer become sentient?  What defines sentience?  What are the drawbacks of AI?  Lots of interesting questions

There is a new AI product that will take your content and create a podcast from it.  Meet Google Notebook LM.  It works differently from ChatGPT because it uses the information you upload and becomes an instance expert at your stuff.  It even generates a podcast discussing your documents/slides/sound files.  Pretty cool stuff  

Have you ever thought about being in two places at one time?  In this episode Mark and Jeff discuss and experiment with voice replacements and an AI Agent.  This is a follow up to a podcast series by Evan Ratliff where he replaced himself in a bunch of situations with an AI version of himself with interesting results.  As usual we also discuss what we have learned in the past week and what media w...

In this episode, Mark and Jeff discuss a AI voice agents as potentially becoming more and more present in podcasts.  They also discuss the possibility of Griefbots to help people deal with the loss of their loved ones.  As usual, Mark and Jeff discuss what they learned this past week and what media they are currently consuming.

In this episode, Mark and Jeff discuss the changes to the podcasting business environment and why some types of podcasts are no longer around as well as the need for some podcasts to only book controversial guests!  New season, new intro (live version of our regular intro music)

In the last episode of Season 3, Mark and Jeff make predictions for the fall of 2024 and then compare them to those made by ChatGPT 4o.  The results were interesting.

Mark recounts the past week where he went to go see Grizzlies in the Khutzeymateen Grizzly bear sanctuary

Fun in one's life helps people live longer but what makes things fun?  Mark and Jeff discuss the components of fun and how you can differentiate between True Fun and Fake Fun

Mark and Jeff discuss the current state of US politics in the wake of the recent change in the Democrats' presumptive nominee and how the Republicans are managing it.  At least what we see from outside the US.  Canada is affected by US politics but has no ability to influence the elections. 

In this episode, Mark and Jeff discuss why people are so easy to fall to the lure of conspiracies rather than believe the obvious.  They discuss a wide variety of conspiracy theories and why people want to believe them.

If you learned as a kid that there are only 5 senses and that the 6th sense is precognition, you have missed the boat.  There are many more senses than 5 but not all are agreed upon.  Despite this there are many additional senses that are agreed upon.  In this episode, Mark and Jeff discuss the additional senses

Today we have a special guest with Kadie Isaac who is interviewed by Mark (Jeff is away).  Kadie is a long time member of the Society for Creative Anachronism and tells us all about this great organization, what she loves about it and her plans to travel to Pennsic

Alcohol is a significant part of our culture and society at large, but is it good for you?  If it is bad for you, how much is too much?  What are the risks?  Mark and Jeff discuss the swing from people thinking alcohol was good for your in the mid 1980's to people thinking no quantity is safe to a more measured understanding of that actual risks involved.

In this episode, Mark and Jeff discuss some fundamental aspects of psychedelic drugs (hallucinogens) and what sets them apart from other illegal drugs such as Opiods

In this episode, Mark and Jeff discuss what is happening to Koalas in Australia, they are dying off at a high rate from a variety of causes... In this episode, we discuss some of the details of what threatens Koalas. 

In this episode, we discuss the deteriorating state of global nuclear balance.  China and Russia are now each other's biggest trade partners and things are not getting better globally.  This is as bad as it was in the 1980's but it seemed even worse back then and people seem to be oblivious to the state of global precariousness as it relates to nuclear stability.  We also talk about how people pic...

In this episode, Mark and Jeff talk about things that have made for great movie and TV franchises, where they have stumbled and what has made them work so well.  We focused on Star Trek, Star Wars, Doctor Who, James Bond and Aliens (but there are many more).  Lots of long lived franchises have definitely had down times and then reboots.

We're back!  Mark and Jeff discuss Sleep Token the Band as well as the controversy related to Ticketmaster's monopoly.  This was a result of a recent trip by Mark to NYC to see the band Sleep Token at Radio City Music Hall as part of their Teeth of God tour.  Spoiler alert! It was a great concert.  There was some drama leading up to the concert but everything turned out well in the end.

Well, in a not to everyone being replaced by AI, this week's topic (and title) were generated from ChatGPT's new 4 Omni.  The suggested topic was more specifically addressing people's mental health when dealing with social media.  ChatGPT even provided some talking points.  Mark and Jeff took it from that starting point.  We also discussed things we learned in the past week and what media we are c...

Jeff discusses his 40 year high school reunion and what he experienced trying to go back.  Things have changed a lot, so have the people.  Some are recognizable, others are not.  Very interesting discussion and experience.  We also discuss what we learned in the past week, sample some coffee and discuss what media we are consuming.

In this episode, Mark and Jeff discuss the importance of sports, both as a participant and as an observer to mental health.  They also discuss the difference on a team between talent and teamwork, lessons that can be applied to the workplace.  As usual, there are a few dad jokes, coffee sampling, talk about alien life and media being consumed.

You are what you eat and weight control is entirely tied to diet.  In this episode Mark and Jeff discuss things that worked for them in the past as well as some misconceptions about how you can lose weight.  We also discuss what we learned in the past week and media we are currenty consuming

Mark and Jeff talk today about a variety of issues but the main topic is understanding coffee and different types of ways of preparing coffee.  This episode will help you when you are considering getting a coffee from your local coffee specialty store (as long as it is not Starbucks because they misuse certain coffee naming conventions).   As usual we discuss what we learned and what media we are...