AI Podcasts, and Warner Bros. Worries

Hi, this is David Kaye, and you're listening

to Altered Geek. Geek. Geek. Geek. It's a wild

ride. Join the discussion. Let's dive into lore.

From Star Trek to Transformers, we're ready to

soar. Superheroes clash as we spark up a flame.

Altered Geek Podcast. Remember the name. Hello,

and welcome to Altered Geek. I'm your host, Steve

Megatron, and joining me on this adventure into

geekdom is TFG1 Mike. I hope you'll keep some

of that. I plan to, Grandpa Simpson. That's right.

Get off my lawn. That's actually pretty good.

Thank you for tuning in. If you like the show,

do me a favor and share it on the socials. You

can also find it on geekcastradio .com and your

favorite podcatcher. And as always, comment on

the episode in your desired method and let us

know what you'd like to hear next. As we kind

of get into a little bit of geek cast radio housekeeping,

as it were, we are almost knee deep in working

out the details of the next top 100. You might

say it's the last time we're doing the first

top 100. Yeah, I mean. It's hard to say. I would

have never guessed as revisiting it. Uh, although

we did kind of plant the joke in the original,

like after that, we'll have to hit this again

in 10, 15 years. Uh, 15 years later, here we

are. Yeah. So 15 years later, which will be 2026.

Yep. Uh, we'll be debuting the next top 100,

which is a revisit to the top 100 animated series

countdown. And. what's awesome about this is

we aren't calling it of all time list which everybody

seems to do which is annoying because it's not

all time it's it's subjective to the network

yep and then on top of it it's not all time because

we all have different opinions on what lands

on a top 100 yep and so that's why we started

priming them with the top 100 animated films

as a countdown yep so it's top 100 countdown

And I've loved it that we've stuck with that

because then I can I can market it better with

all of them being the same name with just a different

theme. Absolutely. So we are. So tell us a little

bit about the episodes that we're currently recording.

So we are currently recording the. He put me

on the spot, folks. We're doing the nominees.

Yeah, so we're doing the nominees. We're doing

the nominees. Let me see if I can pull this up.

The Top 100 animated series nominees countdown.

So we are doing the nominees, and the nominees

will have five episodes. The Top 100 Animated

Series pre -1980s nominees, the 1980s nominees,

the 1990s nominees, the 2000s nominees. Get that

Y2K crap out of here. And then the 2010s to present

nominees. Now, the reason why we are doing the

2010s to present and not the 2010s and the 2020s

is because we've only had half a decade so far

here in the 2020s. So we're only up to 2025.

And basically what this is, is myself, Steve

Megatron here, and Optimus Solo from Cinema Geeks,

the Telecast, Tooncast, and other podcasts here

on the Geekcast Radio Network. We basically sit

down and Optimus Solo reveals to Steve and myself

the... um nominees of who we think either will

or will not be on the or should be on the list

for or what we're gonna vote for to be on the

list of the countdown kind of thing i don't know

is that accurate i don't yeah i mean it'll be

interesting to see yeah because i mean there's

gonna be some that show up that were like I don't

know I mean they are the nominees but the thing

is we broke the list because I mean the last

time we did this I mean we didn't really know

what we were doing either and so there were a

lot of anime not showing up and so people were

like you didn't do any anime you guys suck and

then there was like other animated series that

we didn't do and you know people are like how

could you not have you know like just for example

like Family Guy or you know something you know

South Park I know that they showed up at some

point or at least I think they did I haven't

finished listening to the original one yet I

still have like one left but people were like

calling us out and everything else I mean it

was a great discussion and we were able to piggyback

off IGN and having their dumpster fire for a

list and we threw it together rather fast and

had a multitude of different geek websites But

it was funny just because people were like, this

list tracks way better than IGN's list. And the

reason really quickly why that is, why our list

tracks better than IGN's list. is because IGN's

list was an intro page and then 100 pages, 100

web pages that you had to click through and read

the descriptions of why they ranked the shows.

where they ranked them whereas ours is an audio

podcast that people can listen to episode by

episode where we broke it down since i'm actually

on the page right now because i was actually

looking for the lists on the website where we

broke it down animated series intro where we

discussed the where we discuss what the thing

is going to be 100 to 81, 80 to 61, 60 to 41,

40 to 21, and then 20 to 01. So that's one, two,

three, four. That's five podcast episodes versus

100 web page clicks. Kevin and I spent literally,

we spent a night on Skype because Skype doesn't

exist anymore because Microsoft is a bunch of

bullshit bastard. But we spent a night on Skype

for like three and a half hours going through

the IGN list. And we were like, what is this

and why is this and how the hell can we do this

better? And that's where we came up with the

Top 100 Animated Series Countdown that launched

the GCRN's, the Geekcast Radio Network's Top

100 Countdown series. And that's where we got

that. And then we went to animated films, TV

shows, animated characters, villains, wrestlers,

Transformers, toys. And we are here now back

in the end, almost the end, because it's September

now. We got a few months left here in 2025. We're,

you know, almost 14 and a half, 14 and... seven

tenths of a quarter into 2026 of 15 years later

redoing this and we're redoing it in a way where

we it's not the same way we approached it before

some things are the same but we're also doing

it more informed and 15 years have passed so

many more cartoons have come out in the last

15 years since the first time And it's going

to be different. It's going to be interesting.

It's going to be fun. Like the last one was like

all of the countdowns are. And we, yeah, I'm,

I'm like super pumped for this. And then the

goal with this one is we're going to hit a lot

of the original contributors and we're going

to hit everyone. uh we're gonna at least put

out the fishing of the email you know to see

who uh who wants to contribute but it's gonna

be everyone hopefully and we've had a lot over

the last you know the last 15 years of contributors

for this and so we're like compiling a list we're

working on who we want to reach out to who we

want to you know get all of these different uh

lists from and Like my kids are both like neither

one were born when we did the first one. No,

they're both putting together a list. I've got

a new list. It's been interesting because with

us having 50 per decade or per category. So like

the 1960s have like 50 in the 1970s have 50 and

80s have 50 and 90s have 50. It prevents a lot

of bias. because the 80s and 90s had probably

the strongest animated runs. Yep. And so by us

eliminating a huge chunk, I mean, I was going

through my list and I totally forgot that Mike,

Kevin and I went through this and, you know,

created the 50s. And I was going, well, that

one was there, you know, and. i'm trying to reuse

some and i ended up with like 17 to 20 that weren't

on the list anymore because they were shows that

we deemed not relevant to the top 100 this time

and they were ones on my original list and uh

truthfully i was only gonna have like 10 to 15

different ones and now i have like close to i

don't know 20 or 30 different ones now that weren't

on my original list might might be a little bit

more i think it's i think it's two -thirds or

you know from my old list and another third is

probably brand new to my list because i didn't

list a lot of stuff the first time uh yeah to

the point like a lot of it was just nostalgia

digging this time it's like okay what what did

i enjoy first of all what is prominent in animation

like what has been going on for a long time even

if i don't like for instance like south park

i used to watch it when i was a teenager i don't

give a rip about the show now i don't watch it

at all haven't watched in 10 15 years probably

longer than that and but yet it still deserves

a place because it's you know it it's still going

so in that regard like some of those things i'm

still uh i'm listing them even if i don't really

want to yeah Okay, so I'm going to bring up some

Geekcast Radio Network hullabaloo that happens

a lot, or it used to anyway. I've only ever seen

clips of Family Guy. i've seen and because nowadays

i'm on instagram and i'm on youtube reels i'm

on instagram well i'm on instagram reels and

i'm on youtube short reels and stuff and i doom

scroll and i doom scroll and every now and then

i'll run into a family guy reel or somebody will

share something with me from family guy or i'll

see family guy invading some sort of transformers

reel or something But I've never actively sat

down and watched a Family Guy episode. I don't

have any feelings towards the show either way.

I just have never been interested in watching

that show. So we used to get in trouble by our

listeners and our fans and even people that just

randomly found us. oh my god you said you didn't

like this but you said you never watched it oh

my god how can you have an opinion on something

you never watched or experienced blah blah blah

so while i recognize the legacy of something

like family guy i don't think on my personal

list that i will turn in that i can consciously

rank something that i've never even seen one

episode of that i've never paid attention to

okay you know what i mean like it just doesn't

see i i have the rule i had to have at least

watched five episodes of the show i i agree with

that and random clips yeah i mean i i just i

i agree with the five episode rule random clips

i still count it because if you break it down

like the amount of clips online it probably breaks

down to watching like half a season okay or at

least you know a 10 episode season yeah and for

reference i was trying to find this because i

wanted to just point this out specifically since

i was using family guy as a reference Family

Guy came in at number 21 on the original top

100 animated series list. So just to let everybody

know that one of the most, let's say, popular,

I don't know if it's influential, but popular

animated series did almost crack the top 20 of

our original top 100 animated series list. So

there is that. And that's with me originally

putting it at 100 on my list. And that was only

because of peer pressure. I will defend that

opinion until I die. But I mean, you'll be happy

to know what my kids end on their list. There's

a couple of shows and I'll tell you off air.

But yeah, no, no, no, no. I mean, you'll genuinely

be happy. Yeah, it's not. I was like, really?

smart children smart children you're raising

there let me put it this way i was surprised

what made their top 10 on both of them like i

was like really like I was like, where did you

watch this? They watched it behind your back.

I've never met your children. I've never talked

to your children, but maybe my influence is rubbing

off. No, it's the fact I've shown way too much.

Because some of the shows are ones I've directly...

influenced but um doesn't help i have a geek

cabinet in my office and they come in and they're

like oh this is cool blah blah like who's this

what's this blah blah and then they like watch

whatever it is and that's very true so so i mean

it like like you said it's going to be very fun

it's going to be very different it's going to

be very interesting we want as many as many people

anyone hearing the sound of my voice right now

as soon as we send all the information out to

everybody please respond please participate it's

going to be a blast you're going to want to participate

in this it's gonna be so fun it really is it's

going to be the the spring event of 2026 Yeah.

And let me just put it this way. I have a ton

of new features. Yes. We're going to roll out.

Yeah. We're not telling them what they are yet,

but yes, you do. I want to say, but yeah, we

need to wait because we're going to have a whole,

because that's the thing. Once we, so I, you

don't know this, but I'm assuming we were going

to do this anyway. I thought we were going to

wait until the last episode of the nominees.

And then we were going to reveal all the features.

That's what I thought we were going to do, but

I could be wrong. I think that would be cool

if we did it that way, but we can figure that

out off air. Yeah. Anyway, but whatever, whatever

works. But yeah, I mean, I'm, I'm, I'm looking

forward to seeing, how people take some of this

stuff. Absolutely. I will tease. I'm not going

to say exactly what it is. And this kind of ties

into some of my AI stuff that I've been messing

around with the last few months. Because I've

been doing a lot of optimizations to the website.

I've been speeding up a lot of things. You may

notice there's a slider on the homepage below

the main slider that looks eerily familiar. I

used it. Version 3! Yes, I used AI to update

the version 3 .0 slider because I'm playing around

with an idea for that. And so I wanted to create

it and update it. And then I have a bunch of

other things that it's doing. There's going to

be a lot of audience engagement features with

this top 100 to hopefully drive enough people

to it. One of them is going to be something to

do with submissions. Nice. Requires no app or

other feature per se. It's just going to be something

people can go to the website directly to the

website. There will be some opportunities for

sponsorships and. uh there's we're going all

out on this one this is there's going to be there's

even going to be some like opportunities for

stuff for fans to participate in the top 100

and that's all i'm going to say for right now

until we reveal more information so yep yep but

yeah i these features are working and i've been

playing around with them for a while so i'm hoping

to get a lot of the stuff ironed out between

now and then which i don't see why not because

this uh i have a proposed date time frame and

it gives me enough buffer time for some stuff

in between because uh i have not edited a top

100 yeah wait oh that's right you haven't i have

not at all i don't know i think kevin did the

first few yeah i think kevin did the first few

and then i did the top and you took them over

transformers and and toys yeah i think there

was like one that him and dan took on yeah i

think too but um but yeah i i'm like i'm gonna

throw my hat in i want to yep you know i want

to mess with it Plus, it's it's more of a personal

challenge thing. I'm like, I did a big audio

drama last year that was like over an hour. So

now I'm like, I want to torture myself further.

I know what work you've done. I've I've got automations

for some of this stuff. So however, I know with

the amount of clips I had to do with the audio

drama, what I'm going to be dealing with here.

And so. I can tell you right now with the Transformers

one, the first episode, the final export, it

was, I think that episode is over two hours.

I don't remember and I'm not going to look it

up right now, but I think that that episode is

over two hours. The final export, the final number

of tracks used was something like 117. I mean,

that sounds about right. Yeah. Well, because

specifically for the Transformers one, we did

that special intro thing where we had to throw

in clips and quotes and blah, blah, blah, blah,

blah. Yeah, because I did all the voice characters

for literally everything just to make it unique.

yeah and yep i mean i had to suffer through that

part of it but you had to suffer to listen to

me talk all the time no no no that's not i listen

to you talk all the time when we talk on the

podcast what are you talking about that's okay

i meant like more specifically like you had to

listen to me be different transformers uh that

that's more so what i was getting at but uh but

yeah i mean i'm I'm super excited to take on

the project and try something new. And so we'll,

we'll see where it goes from there. But yeah,

like I said, speaking of automations, this is,

you know, I use AI specifically as a tool, not

as a replacement, honestly, if I could afford.

developer and somebody to mess with the web crap

and be like this is what I want do it I would

much prefer it but I don't have that kind of

cash and so with paying for AI to help me develop

what I'm asking for like I'm mostly using it

to try and create very simplistic plugins to

do things that I was using overly complicated

plugins to do like they were very bloated they

were like you know ones that wanted subscription

-based crap and it's like i really don't need

a settings panel i really don't need all of these

extra features i literally need it for this one

key element and i don't need the rest you know

because a lot of the crap's built into wordpress

like yeah the bulk edit tool the bulk you know

Most of these plugins have things that like when

I needed to have a featured image updated for

like an entire squad of stuff, it's I had to

use a different plugin. Then I had to go through

a bunch of extra steps and like three different

pages and then select all this stuff. And it's

like, or I just go through the regular post library,

select them, check them off, change the image.

Simple. you know i mean it's i i integrated it

with wordpress it was like literally a four or

eight kilobyte file and instead of like a megabyte

program like yeah so it and i'm sure some of

these things will break as wordpress you know

changes stuff but i uh there was i mean there

was even a feature that i'm incorporating for

this top 100 that um hank from tpe entertainment

yep uh he had a version of this but it was very

crude and honestly i couldn't find it and like

he quit developing it a couple years ago like

he was using somebody to develop it and this

is pre -ai and i tested it out and i was like

okay this is a cool feature you know i like it

but i can never get it to look or do exactly

what i needed to do and he was like yeah i'm

not really developing it anymore i sold it to

somebody and i was like okay and so i started

from scratch and i was in a rss .com slack channel

and because i i generally go in there and help

people and kind of coach newbies and people trying

out different features and they were talking

about um a service we used back in the early

days of gcrn and i knew the name sounded familiar

and i couldn't remember why but it was also because

it was 17 years ago and i was like it looks familiar

and then i clicked on it i'm like oh this rings

a bell like i remember now and uh i was like

oh i'm surprised they're still existing and you

know a lot of these use like ai now to transcribe

any of this this stuff or you know it all goes

through their service and you don't own the file

like unless you download it and it's just it's

just a headache so yeah uh i more or less started

from scratch and i was like this is what i want

this is what i wanted to look like and i gave

a mock -up and then i it was like this is what

i wanted to do and after you know a week of going

back and forth with ai i had what i wanted and

So I'm still working on a couple other ones.

But that being said, there is a downside to AI.

Yes. Shall I get to this? Sadly. Because I don't

know where I found this article. I don't know

if I found it in my Google. So it's on the charger

in my bedroom, but I have a Google Pixel 7 Pro.

I need to upgrade my phone eventually. But and

so if you swipe left, right, left, whatever,

you get to the Google feed and in the Google

feed, it has various interests and whatever to

your whatever that you say you're interested

in. And I saw an article on and most of these

articles I have to fact check to make sure like

I have to make sure the websites are actually

legitimate websites. I'm not clicking on something

that isn't. a website I've heard of before. Obviously

we all know the Hollywood reporter, which that's

where this is coming from. Articles written by

Caitlin Houston. It was published September 9th,

2025. 5 ,000 podcasts, 3000 episodes a week,

a dollar cost per episode behind AI startups

planned. Former Wondery exec Janine Wright is

leading a new firm, Inception Point AI, that's

betting on flooding the zone with audio content.

Quote, I think that people who are still referring

to all AI -generated content as AI slop are probably

lazy Luddites. End quote. I'm going to read a

good portion of this, folks, because... As a

17 -year veteran and Steve is a 20 -year veteran

of podcasting, I... Flubber! Why pay a celebrity

podcast host millions when you can create your

own using AI? Inception Point AI is attempting

to do just that. As the company builds a stable

of AI talent to host podcasts and eventually

become... broader influencers across social media,

literature, and more amid the high costs for

producing narrative podcasts and pricey short

-term contracts for popular hosts. The idea here

is being able to own, scale, and control the

talent, unlike those off -the -cuff humans. Excuse

the flubber out of us! and produce shows at a

minimal cost. We believe that, quote, we believe

that in the near future, half the people on the

planet will be AI. Wait, wait, wait, wait, what?

Quote, we believe that in the near future, half

of the people on the planet will be artificial

intelligence. And we're the company that's bringing

those people to life, end quote, said CEO Janine

Wright, who was previously chief operating officer

of the podcasting company Wondery, which has

recently had to reorganize under the changing

podcast landscape. The company is able to produce

each episode for a dollar or less, depending

on length and complexity, and attach pro... programmatic

advertising to it. This generally means that

if about 20 people listened to that episode,

the company made a profit on that episode without

factoring in overhead. Inception Point AI already

has more than 5 ,000 shows across its Quiet Please

podcast network, worst name ever, and produces

more than 3 ,000 episodes a week. collectively

the network has seen 10 million downloads since

its september 2023 debut i guess whatever it

doesn't say debut but since 10 million downloads

since september 2023 it takes about an hour to

create an episode from coming up with the idea

to getting it out into the world well that's

nice The company produces different levels of

podcasts. Lowest level involves weather reports

for various geographic areas or simple biographies

and higher levels involving subject area podcasts

hosted by one of about 50 AI personalities they've

created, including food expert Claire Delish,

gardener and nature expert Nigel Thistledown,

and Oli Bennett, who covers offbeat sports. As

for how it stacks up against human podcasts,

I think that people, quote, I think that people

who are still referring to all AI -generated

content as AI slop are probably lazy Luddites

because there's a lot of really good stuff out

there, quote, end quote, Wright said. The company

has been recently experimenting with short -form

videos and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. The

team is in the midst of navigating the ethics

around creating these AI personalities. As the

technology advances, each host now identifies

themselves as being AI at the top of the episodes,

and they stayed away from having the hosts invent

their own backstories for now, but that could

come. Wright says she could eventually imagine

having hosts chat with listeners or sing happy

birthday to them, but there's... wariness about

diving in too deep quote i am not going to create

a personality that somebody has a deep relationship

with end quote said william corbin co -founder

and cto of the company he added that the company

does not do hard news at this point but right

says they might in the future this just not only

does this hurt my head this boils my freaking

biscuits Are you the line about her saying AI

humans or humans are AI now? Are you flip speak

before I throw a curse? I don't think there's

like such thing as a Luddite thing for, I think

it's just a, I think there's just companies that

are just producing AI. It's still AI slop when

at the end of the day, it's AI slop. Like, there's

there's really no reason to have like ai doing

what essentially the human can do like i i have

no interest in a in a podcast that's hosted by

an ai bot like none whatsoever like i not at

all I honestly, I want I want the human interaction.

I want the person like I want. I want you want

that connection. You want that even if the connection

isn't voice to voice, even if you don't get to

physically talk to them, but being able to reach

out to someone like. Leo, let's just use. Him

as an example, Leo Laporte or my buddy Mike Sims

from Earth2 .net or whomever, whomever you listen

to for podcasts. All right. Perfect example.

From 2020 to right now in 2025, the last six

years of Studio 2009, everyone besides you and

I that I've done a podcast approach with. All

of those podcasters that I've listened to their

podcasts and I've had them on the show and I've

had them tell their stories about how they listen

to or produce their own podcast. All of those

people, all of those people I have interacted

with, whether it be via email, via social media

or whatever, I've had a chance to talk to them

because I've listened to them and I feel like

I know them kind of thing, but I'm not in their

personal life every day. I listen to their podcast.

I might send them a tweet and say, hey, I listen

to your latest episode. Great episode. Really

like this or this. Or, hey, I disagree with this.

Or, hey, this or whatever. But the only thing

I liked about this article is that they could

finish a podcast episode edit in an hour. That's

the only thing I liked about this entire article.

I mean, I'm not going to lie. I can do the same

thing. Okay. it's yeah i yeah uh but we don't

need yeah no we don't need and again like when

spotify announced ai dj i thought the whole point

of spotify was just me i mean obviously you can

get podcasts on there you can listen to us on

there and stuff like that like But that's listening

to podcasts. I thought the whole point for Spotify

for music was to remove the radio part, to remove

the DJ, to remove Spotify premium removes commercials.

I thought that was the whole point. So why are

you adding in an AI DJ to have the feel of radio

again? No, no, don't do that. No, don't. And

stop, please. All right, let's move on to the

Hollywood horses or the monkeys. The monkey's

selfie problem or whatever it is. Yeah, I mean,

this article was about, and this was done a little

bit ago, but it says Hollywood's monkey selfie

problem. Who would actually own a movie made

by AI? Because as we know, they're cutting quarters.

They're trying to, you know, see what they can

get away with. They don't have to pay for trying

to streamline. And I get that from a person,

you know, I mean, certain perspective. Yeah.

If honestly, if I could do a movie like on the

cheap, I would. But yeah, they were saying like

creatives, executives and legal scholars are

all debating what intellectual property even

means in the age of machine intelligence. And

there's not a whole lot of clarity with it. And

they're saying like studios like Lionsgate are

hoping to simplify the issue by exploring siloed

AI models built entirely on their own IP so that

it's not like stealing or it's not like doing

anything outside of their purview, you know,

like a chat GPT or, you know, a copilot or a

Gemini or, you know, whatever. It's their own,

you know, a Lionsgate AI that simply pulls from

their own library, which. I could see, you know,

I could see that being more, you know, something

that they could have and like own the intellectual

property with. They're saying that this Simon

Pullman, an attorney who negotiates like rights

and transactions, kind of argues that even that

approach might be not doable. Like, what if a

studio options a graphic novel and trains, say,

I model on the book's images and text over the

course of months or years? and drags its feet

on adapting the book itself and then you know

a contract might stipulate that the studio won't

pay the property's full purchase price until

a movie goes into production if it ever does

and they're saying like this hypothetical model

would still have access to the creative material

before the studio is paid an agreed upon rate

so then how can you verify what's been used how

can you audit the images or the things And it

would be impossible. And what are the final output?

They're saying that it's unrealistic to expect

all AI -generated work to enter the public domain.

And at the same time, anything that is created

by AI alone is not protected by copyright. And

so AI is, after all, the monkey. And so they're

saying, you know... what can they do to retain

ownership of ai generated ip and you know they're

saying there are two ways through it that um

one is that you have a human with flesh and blood

right at least the original treatment if not

the original script in this model everything

generated from that treatment would be able to

receive protection as a derivative work meaning

that the final film even if created entirely

by ai would be protected by a copyright because

at the core of it a human still wrote the story

and according to you know more they're they're

saying that like visuals that were created by

ai would be open for replication but the film

itself would not you know so people could create

copies of images from it and so like you wouldn't

get in trouble for say having you know a chadwick

boseman picture on your website um but you wouldn't

get in trouble if you had the film on your website

so well obviously they're saying you know the

second way to go is that you have the whole thing

done by ai including the treatment and then at

the end you have someone go through and humanize

it by doing either a little colorization some

special effects or editing you prove that the

final version has embedded in it human created

creative elements so non you know small non -material

changes color correction so on would not rise

to the level of being protectable um and so they

agree that you know it would be monkeying around

would not protect all the movie's individual

elements and believes it might prevent someone

from ripping off the film wholesale but uh the

second strategy wouldn't stop someone from reverse

engineering a treatment for your film and then

having their ai version of the film that didn't

have all your subtle human tweaks. So in other

words, you could re -edit like an entire, you

know, film franchise, like, you know, the Obi

-Wan, you know, miniseries and turn it into a

film for, for instance, and clean it up. Or,

you know, you hated the latest Trek series, you

know, omitting certain things from it and rewriting

this, you know, I mean, there's so many different

issues with this. there's there's no clarity

on it obviously but yeah they the studios don't

fully know what to do with it like it's it's

a constant legal battle unless you're like someone

like me for instance like i'm developing ai stuff

and i don't care to copyright it because at some

point i'm sure somebody fed it information and

it's getting it from somewhere And it's creating

what I'm asking for because all the information

is publicly accessible. You know, it's scraping

it from somewhere to create the apps, I'm sure.

Or it just has that capability to write the code.

But, you know, they're saying pretty much with

this AI, though, that you could use AI tools,

but it still has to be. fundamentally you know

born from a human and worked on by a human and

yeah like Netflix has like an ethical use of

AI for instance too of what you're allowed to

do not allowed to do and what you're allowed

to train and not allowed to train but they all

have their own AI at this point so it's it's

going to be an interesting time to see over the

next five ten years what what is created by AI

what is protectable what is not what we can replicate

ourselves because we're like, Hey, I want to

make basically a fanfic of this and make it do

what I want. And, you know, we're also at the

point too, that all these studios are trying

to sue AI, but yet they're kind of the ones that

have fed it too. Yeah, of course. And lastly,

I'm just going to bring this up really quick

because it kind of means a lot to me. Luckily,

they're not erasing what already happened, but

Tron producer reveals why it took 15 years to

make a new movie. And if legacy is canon, this

is coming from comicbook .com. Article was written

by Kofi Outlaw, written September 4th, 2025.

And I'm going to focus on the section of the

article where it says, when Tron Legacy hit in

the 2010s, the world was just getting into mainstream

stride with social media. Now we live in a world

where the entire generation was raised on digital

life and AI is set for world -shifting evolution

any day now, the effects of which no one can

accurately predict, according to Springer, one

of the producers. support window of opportunity

for this particular Tron movie. I mean, one thing

that's interesting is that it's, quote, a very

long time since the development process and a

long time since Legacy. But the interesting thing

is that with each year that has passed, the idea

that doesn't become dated actually becomes more

relevant, Springer explained. So basically, I'm

going to skip down to where it says. So basically,

Tron Ares is a new story. They are not telling

the continuing story from Tron Legacy. So Tron

Legacy was supposed to have a sequel. It was

going to be called Tron Ascension because that

was the whole point. At the end of Legacy, Sam

and Korra went into the real world. And that

third movie was supposed to be called Tron Ascension.

That's why on the Blu -ray or DVD or whatever

it was, they had the special feature Tron the

next day where Box Lightner Tron, his character

meets up with Ram in the real world and they

talk about the company and whatever else. But

he says that we're not telling that story right

now and deciding to move forward to a new story,

but we're not undoing that either. So it's still

out there. So at least they're not erasing the

second film. They're just moving past it and

telling a completely different story. And honestly,

out of all, because I've kept up with Tron Ares,

I've seen the official trailer. I've seen some

of the behind the scenes stuff. I'm about to

listen to the soundtrack after we record this

podcast because it's out now. Soundtrack this

time around is done by Nine Inch Nails. Last

time for Legacy, it was done by Daft Punk, which

I think at this point, Daft Punk have broken

up, unfortunately, but it is what it is. I'm

interested. I don't care that it's Leto. i've

seen him in in the trailer and in the behind

the scenes stuff he's fine whatever doesn't matter

to me thank god he's not in joker makeup oh uh

but uh yeah no it's a neutron movie i'm i'm curious

about it so yep and uh those are all the news

articles yeah and then we get to I mean, I am

excited for Tron. Don't get me wrong. Cool. We'll

have to see what transpires when this comes out.

So that being said, we have the fact that Warner

Brothers has been tossed around like a bad ex

-girlfriend that nobody wants. from different

studios and you know kids there were three studios

water brothers paramount and columbia pictures

and they all kind of got along sometimes they

would fight sometimes they would argue and then

they would make deals and everybody was happy

and now look at what the fakakta has happened

yeah uh yeah so they they announced i mean as

everybody knows like cbs and paramount split

you know in the mid 2000s and then they re -merged

over the last couple years went from cbs to just

flat out paramount and viacom yeah well viacom

i think spun them off yep and yeah so cbs and

paramount re -merged and then sky dance bought

paramount that's surprising well i'm kind of

happy about that because that means that we're

more likely going to be in luck for new trek

content um so i'm i'm a little i'm a little excited

about it i'm not gonna lie um so Anyways, Paramount

with, you know, Skydance Ellison is eyeing Warner

Brothers Discovery and, you know, sparked rumors

that also Netflix and others are also evaluating

the legendary studio, which happens to be on

the theatrical hot streak in 2025. Meanwhile,

you know, they're all running the numbers and,

you know, confirmed. David Ellison's Paramount

Skydance is preparing mostly cash bid for all

of Warner Brothers. Backed by his father, Larry's

Oracle fortune. And then the rumor is Netflix

is considering a bid. According to a lot of different

sources and, you know, they'd likely only want

the studio and streaming assets. So like. I think

they would want. You know, the superheroes, like

all of the stuff that they could get from it.

Yeah. Yeah. Which, you know, I mean, if you're

getting all the Hanna -Barbera, you're getting

all that, you know, all of the anime stuff. I

mean, that's like a goldmine for Netflix. And

then they really wouldn't need HBO Max. No, unfortunately,

they could almost spin them as a separate channel.

Like a separate like how like how Disney does

it. Yeah. with like the national geographic and

things like that. Like, yeah, they can have their

own category in there. I mean, all of this stuff

would be easily accessible, but they could break

it down. So like all of this stuff that originally

was released on HBO or, or Cinemax could show

up there. And I have a problem with that because

I am an HBO max subscriber. I could see that.

But if Netflix takes it, there's no reason for,

I mean, that would be like, disney keeping hulu

a separate app like i could see them phasing

it out yeah i know i understand but yeah they're

not gonna keep it if they buy it yeah true it's

just it's either it lives on as a channel or

it doesn't survive at all or maybe they spin

it as like netflix's like geek website hub so

it's you know the hbo max hub or you know the

hbo hub You know, Netflix is HBO or Homebox Office

and just get rid of HBO and call it Homebox Office.

Well, it's still HBO. I know, but naming wise,

it doesn't make sense with Netflix. And then

NBCUniversal, which is owned by Comcast, has

been running the numbers too. And they have a

lot more regulatory hurdles making them a long

shot because they also own Universal. I mean,

it's NBC and Universal owned by Comcast. I don't

see the FCC. I don't see them allowing them to

own it. It's different from where Amazon bought

MGM. Because it was a legacy studio that was

bought by Amazon to be their studio. It's not

like Columbia Pictures being bought by Sony.

each i feel like each of these conglomerates

should be allowed to own one of the original

tent poles but not multiple yeah no not multiple

and i still can't i still can't believe sony

owns columbia i forgot about that yeah because

when i hear sony i don't think sony pictures

i think sony walkman i think sony cd player i

think playstation yeah place i don't think sony

pictures so and the funny part is they you know

and then disney you know fox owned like new light

and cinema and a bunch of other ones yep and

disney owns all of those like they own like 50

different studios under their name now uh i don't

know if i i honestly hope that paramount skydance

gets to buy warner brothers I hope because it'll

put Paramount and Warner Brothers on an even

playing field with Disney and Netflix. Yeah,

that's true. They're saying that if they bought

them, they would have as many subscribers between

because right now they have a, you know, Paramount

and HBO Max have a fraction of what what Netflix

or Disney has. Yeah, but combined they'd have

they would. they would have this massive like

they would be they would still be third but they

would actually be third to netflix and disney

and so that would put them in such an advantage

because um i also see paramount being like well

we're gonna keep around all of these old you

know i feel like they would still probably have

two different apps yeah um But it would be a

different way of spinning it. Oh, if you want

more content, get the HBO Max. Or they may roll

it all into HBO Max and just have Paramount be

Paramount and have the Plus go over to the HBO

side. I don't know. Run that top three again

by me. Of who's looking to buy WB? No, what the

top three would be. It would be Netflix, Disney,

and then the Paramount Warner Brothers. I just

had a 40 -year flashback to 1985. Holy shnikes.

40 years ago in 1985, it was NBC, ABC, and CBS

were all vying on television for that top three

that whoever was going to be number one, number

two, number three on TV. And again, 40 years

ago, it was Warner Brothers, Paramount, and Columbia

as the movie studios vying for the top three

spots. And now, 40 years later, current day in

2025, list it again. Netflix, Disney, and Paramount.

jesus christ so amazon is you know i know they're

up there too and i know that yeah uh nbc universal

is up there as well but i honestly don't see

any reason to have either of those like netflix

is always my number one disney it is like kind

of the number two and then if paramount got wb

that would be a number three like those would

be the top three that i feel like people would

be like okay i gotta have these you know And

yeah, for me, it's like I'll get Netflix again

at some point. It's not a major, major thing

for me. But for me, Disney is major because David

Draper and I cover a lot of the Star Wars stuff

on 2009. And because Disney owns Hulu. And because

my new favorite show, even though I knew about

this show when it came out last year, but I never

really, it's funny when you don't pay attention

to stuff, it doesn't really come across your

timeline or whatever on social media. When you

start paying attention to it and you post like

two different or three different posts about

it, all of a sudden it's freaking everywhere.

And just. I started watching ABC's High Potential.

It's this new comedy cop drama show, and it's

really funny and it's really awesome. I'm at

the last episode of the first season. They are

releasing the second season now on Hulu, so I'm

probably going to wait until they fully release

the second season to actually watch it because

I hate appointment television. I would rather

binge on my own time. But it's one of those things

where for me right now, Disney, I've already

paid for it for a year. I don't get charged again

until April of next year. So it's already paid

for. So, you know, it is what it is. And luckily,

when they said that they were going to fully

envelope Hulu in, I had already canceled my Hulu

subscription at the time. I have been a Hulu

proponent since day one because I liked how the

Hulu app and everything else was laid out on

it. I liked what they offered. I liked the way

the user interface was on the Hulu. I watch things

on my computer. So really, it was the website

that I liked. The app was fine, but I really

don't watch things on my phone. And I really,

at the time, back then, I didn't have a TV nice

enough to really warrant watching things. Like

right now, I have a 55 -inch 4K television, so

of course I'm going to watch stuff on it. But

yeah, so now that Disney owns them and it's included

in Disney +, and blah, blah, blah. But yeah,

I mean, it's just funny how... Things change,

but they kind of that's my point about bringing

up the TV stations from 40 years ago or the movie

studios from 40 or 50 or 60 years ago to now

with Netflix, Disney and blah, blah, blah. You

know, being in the first top three spots. I find

myself buying episodes or seasons of stuff on

Amazon more so than using the Prime benefits

to stream stuff on Prime. See, I hate Amazon

Prime for their video. I legitimately do because

they they kind of trick you and say, oh, we have

that. But you got to subscribe to this other

service like it's not. It's not included. And

so in that regard, like, I really don't like

them. And I'm more apt to go somewhere else.

Like, honestly, I'll, you know, if Tubi has it,

I'll go to Tubi. If, you know, whoever else has

it, like, I'll go, you know, unless it's another

pay thing. And then I'm like, well, I don't really

care enough to see it right now anyway. And then

I'll just hit up, like, a local library, which

still rents movies. And they don't cost nothing.

Yeah, no. 2B is amazing. 2B is one of the best

resources out there. So. But yeah, just because

all these studios are thinking about bids doesn't

guarantee that they'll get them. Yeah, true.

Look how long it took Skydance to get Paramount.

Yeah, very true. But the Ellisons that own Skydance

want all of WB. Including the debt, the cable

channels that everyone else is avoiding. Most

buyers can't or won't pay for all of WB's losing

TV channels. But the Ellison's and they have

the Oracle fortune backing them. Yep. So they're

willing to take everything to avoid a bidding

war for just the streaming and studio assets

that everybody else wants. But it's also like

industry people are freaking out because they're

saying it could be fewer buyers, which equals

fewer projects getting greenlit. And they're

terrified of Netflix buying it because, you know,

for cinema purists, because they're like, imagine

Batman, Harry Potter and, you know, Barbie all

being trapped behind a streaming paywall. Which

eventually they all end up there anyway. Yeah,

you get the cinema and then afterwards they're

on a paywall. You can't watch any of the Batman

series on Netflix anymore because like they're

all on, you know, the WB. Or like Justice League

used to be on there. That's gone. Because I honestly

used to watch. Like Justice League on. On Netflix.

Oh, right, because it's on HBO Max. You can watch

The Flash, Legends of Tomorrow, Supergirl, Arrow.

You can watch the CW stuff, but you can't watch

any of the... And they all used to be on Netflix.

Give or take. They didn't have Batman The Animated

Series or Batman Beyond or Superman, but they

had Justice League and Unlimited. So, I mean,

there's... Right now, they've even got... They've

got some Scooby -Doo stuff. And then you have

some Paramount stuff with Ninja Turtles, the

2012 series. You've got some Disney with Spider

-Man. This is why I'm so glad that I bought the

Batman Beyond and the Justice League Blu -rays

when they came out. Well, and I used to have

all the DVDs. I got rid of all that stuff ages

ago. What's funny is I was looking because, I

mean, every once in a while you can find crap

on archive .org. Yeah. But I was looking through

my hard drive and I'm like, oh, before I sold

them, I ripped them all to my computer. Yeah,

that's right. Well, and I found them like after

I've been looking for weeks, like I was trying

to figure out, you know, because I don't have

them. Like the only place you can buy any of

these DVDs is by chance at like Walmart. And

it's not stupid expensive. It's really not. It's

just, it's just more so like, I'm like, where

the heck am I going to put it? Like, I don't

have like, I mean, my geek office is blown up

again over the last five years. And I really

don't have the real estate for DVDs. I like them

to some degree, but at the same time, it's like,

when do I ever like my laptops, my new laptops

have no DVD player. They have no disc player.

So like it's completely useless there. My desktop,

I have a disc player, but I also have the digital

file. So it's like, when am I going to ever put

the disc in? And then that's my living room.

I have a Blu -ray player, but it's so ancient

that I mean, it's an early Sony. It's it barely

functions anymore without making a sound, you

know, so I'm kind of. at this this loss i'm like

i i want them like i want to own them but at

the same time i don't have the space for them

so like the digital file is better but i don't

want to like unless i've owned them in the past

like i don't have the you know i don't have the

the digital file unless i physically own the

disc at one because that's i ripped them all

before i got rid of them yeah that's one of the

reasons why i like um fandango at home it used

to be voodoo through walmart but um fandango

at home uh just i like that because i have the

same thing like i had like when i got the batman

beyond physical media thing came with a digital

copy code for the entire series so i have it

both in physical media and in In digital media.

See, I just don't like I'm tied to an app. Like

if I physically had the file like the MP4, I'd

be fine with that. Yeah, I understand that. But

I mean, anymore, I've like Beast Wars. I have

the discs still. Yet. Yet. I have 4K versions.

Yeah. That somebody converted to 4K upscale.

because one they're not hd like the discs from

shop factory are not hd they're not hd they need

to be they better do something for the 30th anniversary

next year so i mean they need to come out with

the full well they need to come out with like

the discs like the 30th anniversary of beast

wars and then have it come with a soundtrack

disc but have all of the different actual musics

Because I still have the ones that like Brian

Kilby gave me years and years and years and years

ago. We started all, you know, started the Geek

Cast Radio Network after I'd been doing all things

Transformers for a hot second there. And he he

had somehow gotten versions of it without audio.

And I was like, oh, these are cool. I think they

edited some of them. But at the same time, like

they. they were good enough. There was like 84

tracks or something. And I was like, okay, this

is, this is decent enough that I can work from

it. And then I found some bad area, uh, beast

machines, uh, music. So like I was able to do

the Megatron, you know, for the beast unleashed

podcast commercial. And so, I mean, all of those

just worked great, but, um, yeah, it'd be nice

if they did something decent for that. And then,

uh, And I hope Hasbro does too. I hope we get

a Transmetal Megatron. I hope we get a Depth

Charge. I hope we get updated versions of some

of these characters that can kind of go with

the anniversary of it. But yeah, it's neither

here nor there. But anyways, I think this about

wraps this episode up. Yup. So remember, if you

would like to hear your feedback on this episode

or leave us a question and answer. You can email

feedback at geekcastradio .com or comment on

the episode post. So, yeah, thanks as always

for listening to Altered Geek. I've been your

host, Steve Megatron with TFG with Mike. And

until next time, get altered, get geeky with

the Altered Geeks. He's an old man. He lost his

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