The Paesanos Podcast

Sean Lukasik (00:02.358)
All right, hey, Maddie. Thank you for doing this. It's been like a couple months in the making, but for those who don't know, Maddie and I are cousins, we're related, and in two separate cities in New York right now. And Maddie sent me an email a couple of months ago with some podcast topic ideas. And they've been...

Maddie (00:03.569)
Hey, Sean.

Sean Lukasik (00:30.114)
kind of bouncing around in my head, one of which I actually had a chance to talk a little bit with Kate Lindsay about on a recent episode. But the more I thought about those ideas, the more I wanted to have Maddie on the podcast. And, you know, even in a capacity that could develop into more regular appearances, because I know we both love talking about this stuff. I know you've been listening to the podcast and... texting me things here and there. And so, yeah, so that's my introduction. How are you?

Maddie (01:06.895)
I'm good. I'm good. I'm excited to be on the podcast and talk in more feels like an official capacity and being chronically online because normally it's just me and my friends talking about how we should probably delete social media apps off of our phones. So yeah, I'm excited to chat through all the things that I've been thinking about.

Sean Lukasik (01:24.094)
Yeah, so in that email, that first email, you shared some awesome topic ideas, and I'm sure we'll hit on a couple of them today. But at the end, you had this sentence that just kind of said, you know, in general, I'm just kind of chronically online. And so I'm sure I'll be sending you more ideas. And I've heard that term before. But when you sent that to me, it got me thinking about the ways in which I'm chronic.

chronically online because I think the same thing is true for me sometimes. But I wonder first why you said that? What makes you feel like you're chronically online and what are some examples of that?

Maddie (02:06.617)
Yeah, that's a good question. I've been thinking a lot about how I would define chronically online. And I think you kind of have to know it when you see it. But I also think it's, and I think it's like different. Like I think your chronically online is probably a lot different than what my chronically online looks like because of social media algorithms and the way we get like funneled into things. But I think it's just like, I notice it the most on Twitter, actually. I think TikTok is kind of like that for Gen Z a little bit.

Sean Lukasik (02:15.97)
Mm-hmm.

Maddie (02:34.801)
where you see a take on something and you're like, only someone who has spent too much time on the internet would have this opinion on this thing. And I was having a hard time coming up with an example until Henry Kissinger died, and then I was graced with so many wonderful examples of being chronically online. I think the first one was a tweet, and all it said was, where's the Bourdain quote? And then, which, if you are chronically online on Twitter, or on the parts of Twitter at least that I'm on, you know that like,

Sean Lukasik (02:43.124)
Mm-hmm.

Sean Lukasik (02:49.501)
Mm-hmm.

Maddie (03:04.165)
a lot of younger millennials, maybe all millennials, and a lot of Gen Z hate Henry Kissinger. And Anthony Bourdain did too, and he has a very famous quote about it. And then the next tweet that I saw where I was like, you have to spend so much time on the internet to have any idea what this tweet means. Like I thought about, like if I showed my mom this, she'd be like, it's like a foreign language, but it was a photo of Cami from the bear, like ferociously whisking something and yelling and the.

Sean Lukasik (03:09.121)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Sean Lukasik (03:24.182)
Yes. Yeah.

Maddie (03:30.365)
caption on it was everyone logging in for their overtime on Twitter.com. After seeing that Henry Kissinger died. And again, like you just need all the context of like, who is Cami from the bear? What is like, what is that show about? What is his personality like on the show? What does that have to do with. Henry Kissinger dying and like, what do you mean, overtime on Twitter? Like it just there are so many layers of it. And I think that's especially big on Twitter. I think you often see tweets where it's like there are so many layers that you have to understand for this to make.

any sense to you. And I think that's a big, big part of my Chronically Online.

Sean Lukasik (04:01.474)
that? Yeah. Well, no, and I love that example. And, you know, just I don't know, the more you talk about this stuff, the more I my brain gets churning. So chronically online for you is generally social media, like in general, because I think that's true for me too, although I've definitely transitioned off of Twitter, not entirely. And I still get things sent to me from

Maddie (04:17.938)
Mm-hmm.

Sean Lukasik (04:29.966)
from Twitter or X and that gets me back into that news feed when I click on it, but I haven't posted anything or really opened the app directly in several months at this point. But yeah, I know that's a place where a lot of that discourse has happened.

Maddie (04:48.421)
Yeah, Twitter is definitely like past its golden age, I think, because there was a time when like it felt like. Even before the pandemic, like everyone could unite around one thing. Instantly, and sometimes that was like watching an episode of The Bachelor or watching the Super Bowl or, you know, I think this, I guess, was during the pandemic, but it was when that ship got stuck in the Suez Canal and because it's not always like necessarily important events, sometimes are just like weird things happening in the world that everyone on Twitter is like.

Sean Lukasik (04:51.875)
Mm-hmm.

Sean Lukasik (05:09.664)
Yeah.

Maddie (05:17.233)
comedian and has their own take on it. It's not it's not the same as it used to be, but I think there's still a lot of it there.

Sean Lukasik (05:25.086)
Well, I was going to actually have this conversation later in the episode, but I mean, we're talking about it now. I'm thinking about like some of the trends and things that are, that are changing. Every time I see like Elon Musk just famously told his advertisers to F off. And that he doesn't need any of their money and they've been happy to oblige, which has also been interesting. And every time something like that.

Maddie (05:47.129)
Yeah.

Sean Lukasik (05:51.33)
happens or you know, the reason why advertisers were pushing back in the first place, of course, was the content that was appearing next to their ads was not so wholesome. Um, and so every time that happens, I see more and more people get on threads. Like I get some notifications that are like this person recently was a musician, it was a designer who I've only followed on, um, Twitter and Instagram.

And so like that, you know, it's like it comes in little spurts. And, and then I go into threads and I look around a little bit. And I see a bunch of pictures just like Instagram and it's not really, it's not the same and I leave, um, have you tried, have you been on there yet at all? Or. Yeah.

Maddie (06:36.441)
No, I haven't. I feel like Twitter is sad as it is to like be on it during Twitter's decline. It's like I just don't think you can recreate it. Like I don't think there's anything you can directly point somebody to, whether it be like threads or Reddit or whatever. You're never going to get the exact same experience. And I think the like downfall of threads is that they're trying to just be like, just get off of X or Twitter or whatever and just come here and it'll be the same. And it's not I think part of it is because like a lot of people have been on Twitter have been there for.

Sean Lukasik (06:48.214)
Mm-hmm.

Maddie (07:05.561)
over a decade. And you have like, because I don't, I think a lot of people I see on Twitter, I don't even really follow, but I just keep getting served their things because you see them, you interact with them. It's like part of the things that you're clicking on. I have no idea how to go find them on threads or like, do I really even want to? Because like at this point I have, I've been on Twitter since I think I was like a freshman in high school. So that's like almost, oh my God, it's almost 15 years. Wow, that's scary. But like I can't tell you the number of times I'm like, I should just delete this stupid app.

Sean Lukasik (07:18.783)
Right.

Sean Lukasik (07:29.088)
Yeah.

Maddie (07:33.713)
Like I don't, a lot of the stuff that you see, you're like, this is annoying, or like this is just like fluff. Like I don't really need any of this in my life, or you know, the bills have bad couple of weeks and everyone's like, this is the end. We've missed our window, whatever. And so it's like, I just, why am I on here in the first place? And so I think for me, I'm like, I'm gonna go down with Twitter and I'm not gonna replace it because that's something I probably never really needed in my life anyway.

Sean Lukasik (07:40.942)
Mm-hmm.

Sean Lukasik (07:47.543)
Yeah.

Sean Lukasik (07:59.546)
Right. No, yeah, that's definitely true. And I think the thing for me is like, I'm not as nostalgic for Twitter, even though I've been on it since like 2008 or something. I'm not as nostalgic for Twitter as I am for like, Facebook, which started while I was in college. You know, you had to get on Facebook with a dot edu.

Maddie (08:15.568)
Mm.

Sean Lukasik (08:22.418)
Um, email address at the time. And then, uh, and so like, even though I never post a Facebook, I still go on there and I scroll a little bit and see what people are up to, um, and you know, generally it's like our family members ranting about something, but, uh, but there's something like a little nostalgic. Like I don't think I could delete. Facebook for that reason, Twitter I have a different relationship with, and I haven't deleted it yet because.

the point you just made about how it's like nothing can really replace it. It's, it's that style of conversation is fun. I mean, it's, it really is. And, uh, and I don't know another place where I could see that.

Maddie (08:58.641)
Mm-hmm.

Maddie (09:04.741)
Yeah. It's funny that you say that, because I think we're on like opposite ends of the millennial generation. And it makes sense that like you feel more nostalgic towards Facebook. Because for me, like, I haven't really actively used Facebook probably since I graduated from college. And like, I still have it. But I usually actually I think I use Facebook almost as like a Reddit sometimes because like the things that I use it for, like Facebook groups about like, I don't know, like buy nothing groups or groups where I'm still connected to like people from high school. But

Sean Lukasik (09:10.55)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Sean Lukasik (09:24.871)
Oh, yeah.

Maddie (09:34.357)
less like I don't really do a lot of scrolling to see what people are posting. I'm like, well, my friends share with me whatever important thing that they put on here. But yeah, definitely. I think people my age are going to be more nostalgic for like Instagram and Twitter, whereas like it's funny because now I see people who are just a little bit younger than I am, who are like I never even had a Facebook and like Instagram. Like, I don't think they have any feelings of nostalgia. Instagram's kind of like changing a lot, too. But I think they'll probably feel it for TikTok.

Sean Lukasik (09:37.408)
Yeah.

Sean Lukasik (09:59.159)
Yeah.

Sean Lukasik (10:02.454)
That's true. I, in, in Instagram, like when I was writing down my, like how I'm chronically online, um, Instagram is definitely my social media of choice. It's where I end up in the like doom scroll situation. I don't necessarily go to Instagram with like, uh, task in mind. Um, and I, I post mostly to stories, but, um, I, I still post, uh, photos to my feed and, and it's not.

Maddie (10:15.823)
Mm.

Maddie (10:22.577)
Hahaha.

Sean Lukasik (10:31.478)
that often. But yeah, it's like that's the app that gets mindlessly open when I'm just like sitting in a waiting room or, you know, eating or whatever. And, and yeah, so when I think about being chronically online, but it's that's a lot of lurking, like it's not engaging back and forth necessarily, which again, is totally something that I miss and don't see anywhere but Twitter.

Maddie (10:40.017)
Mm-hmm.

Maddie (10:50.151)
Yeah.

Maddie (10:59.077)
Yeah, I feel like Instagram back when I was like in college was more. Interactive, I guess, and they've I think they've tried to introduce more things like the like button on stories, which I use very liberally. But they've changed, I think a lot, and they're like explore page and they're obviously reals. And so it does feel like a lot more like tick tock, a lot more lurky, a lot like it's so easy to get on there and just like scroll endlessly and find things that you're like maybe interested in.

Sean Lukasik (11:05.975)
Mm-hmm.

Sean Lukasik (11:12.992)
Yeah.

Maddie (11:28.701)
but I feel like it definitely you see a lot less of the people that you're actually like personally connected to on there.

Sean Lukasik (11:33.522)
Right, right. Yeah, I find topics or like themes getting recommended to me, whether it's like hiking in the Adirondacks, like all of a sudden I see all these accounts that I don't definitely don't follow but use the same hashtags and things. And of course, you know, Buffalo sports and that kind of stuff.

Maddie (11:46.555)
Mm-hmm.

Maddie (11:53.737)
Yeah, I also it seems like Instagram's algorithm has gotten a lot more like it adapts a lot faster to you Which I noticed actually with all the Taylor Swift Travis Kelsey Stuff because I would click on like one post in my explore page and then the next day it had like three different posts there And the next day it's like almost all the posts are about Travis and Taylor and I'm like, I don't I don't care that much about them I just wanted to look at that one post

Sean Lukasik (12:00.215)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Sean Lukasik (12:04.151)
Yeah.

Sean Lukasik (12:17.35)
No. Well, and so interesting that I had that in mind also, because I've just this week started seeing a resurgence of the conversations about Taylor Swift's, like carbon footprint and how massive it is, and how many I forget what the measurement is like carbon tons or something she's put into the atmosphere just

Maddie (12:34.088)
Mm.

Sean Lukasik (12:45.622)
because of her relationship with Travis Kelce. So, you know, she's flying on a private jet to go to all of his games and then back to her tour and then back to the games and everything. And so it's so funny how like her career and her like viral impact on the world just ebbs and flows like that. And I guess it's like anything, but because she's so massive in popularity, it's like all this incredible,

Maddie (13:08.314)
Mm-hmm.

Sean Lukasik (13:15.35)
the most amazing person and I'm just starting to see it shift in the other direction of like, I can't believe she's doing this to the environment and then I'm sure it'll be back in the other and it's not the same people. It's just, you know, what gets louder at what time so I thought this week that's been pretty interesting.

Maddie (13:26.27)
Mm-hmm.

Maddie (13:33.065)
Well, it's funny, too, because this week has also been her birthday. And so I feel like this kind of kind of like gets into a little bit of like fandom culture, where I think for a while you see so many positive posts about her and about her relationship with Travis and the tour and how it's like economically impacted a lot of places. And I think at least from what I see on Twitter, it's a lot of like Taylor Swift, like hardcore stans posting all these really wonderful things that she does and just like giving her all her flowers. And no, no one has anything to say.

Sean Lukasik (13:36.021)
Oh, right. Yeah, yeah.

Sean Lukasik (13:41.236)
Mm-hmm.

Maddie (14:02.001)
poorly about her. And then I think sometimes when like that gets a little bit too loud, you have people who are just like sick of the discourse or who are like, maybe big fans of people who are like at odds in some way with Taylor Swift, who are like, okay, but we can't forget that, you know, here she is using a private jet to travel to Kansas City every week or, you know, whatever it is.

Sean Lukasik (14:13.601)
Yeah.

Yes.

Sean Lukasik (14:21.342)
Yeah. And I know like it's human nature or not. It's human nature. It's internet human nature to like, want to drag people down a little bit and want to like, harsh their no, what's the not harsh your mellow yuck their yum or something. But yeah, to like so I you know, I can see why people would come out of the woodwork just to point out some negative aspects of her and her career and that kind of thing. But

Maddie (14:36.842)
Oh yeah.

Sean Lukasik (14:48.31)
Yeah, the fandom culture piece is interesting. The other another example of being chronically online for me is the New York Times Games app. Do you use that at all?

Maddie (14:59.827)
Um, yeah, I don't use the app. I just use like the... Like I just search it in Chrome. Yeah, I don't actually think I realized there was a game app.

Sean Lukasik (15:02.601)
Oh.

Sean Lukasik (15:07.678)
Interesting. Okay. I Oh, yeah. Yeah. And it's a separate subscription altogether. So you could just get the games subscription. And I've gotten to the point where like, I probably spend about a full hour each day in that app because I want to do the word. Oh, I want to do the connections, which is a relatively new app, the crossword itself, the mini crossword. They've got like

six or seven little games in there now that, you know, it takes anywhere from 30 to 60 seconds for some games, you know, all the way up to could be 30 minutes. And I'm seeing like my social media algorithms are shifting as well. And I don't know what the connection is there. But I'm seeing like, you know, the difficulty rate ranking of this morning's connections puzzle and it and

Maddie (15:55.749)
I'm out.

Sean Lukasik (16:05.066)
It's just wild that I'm not interacting with like another human in that app. Uh, and when I think about internet culture, um, that scares me a little bit, but it is, it's like, it's addicting to me and I'm seeing it start to like permeate my news feeds also, but you're not using the games app at all.

Maddie (16:11.153)
Yeah.

Maddie (16:24.201)
It's so interesting. No, it's funny though, because I do, I have played all of the games at one point or another, and I feel like I go through like phases. At the job that I had pre-pandemic, we would all play the mini-Crossword every morning and to see like who had the fastest time. I haven't done that one in a while. I was big on Wardle for a long time. I'm like transitioning to connections. And I do, I play the spelling bee a lot. I think that one's fun. I'm not super good at crosswords. So I usually avoid like the bigger one, but spelling bee seems to like.

Sean Lukasik (16:37.679)
Mm-hmm Yeah

Sean Lukasik (16:45.806)
Mm-hmm. Yes, yep.

Maddie (16:54.089)
scratch a similar itch for me. But maybe I should download the app. That's fun. I'd love to actually to know like the connections, like how hard it is. Because there are some days I look at it and I'm like, this is no way.

Sean Lukasik (16:56.203)
Yeah.

Good luck with that.

Sean Lukasik (17:07.134)
Yeah, right. Sometimes I open it and I feel like a genius. And then other times I it's like I've never seen words before. The the rating, the difficulty rating I have not seen in the app. I've seen it in like the New York Times, Twitter account, or they'll post on threads like the difficulty out of out of five or whatever. And sometimes I'll go Oh, well, that makes sense that it only took me a minute to do the connections this morning. And I'm holding this wordle inspired mug.

Maddie (17:10.426)
Mm-hmm.

Maddie (17:13.757)
Yeah.

Maddie (17:18.522)
Mm.

Maddie (17:36.709)
Oh no way, that's good.

Sean Lukasik (17:38.502)
which is made, I learned by, um, Kate Lindsay, who was a previous guest on this podcast, um, in just like learning about some of the work that she does and, and checking out her website, um, I saw that she, she hand makes these it's, it's incredible. And, uh, so now, um, this is like a meta like podcast slash wordle connected, uh, mug that I'm drinking coffee out of.

Maddie (17:54.737)
That's so cool.

Maddie (18:00.393)
I'm sorry.

Sean Lukasik (18:06.11)
But yeah, that's the internet world we live in. So speaking of I wanted to do some like past guest updates. The idea and I'm sure I'll share this with you know, my friends directly as well and like some of the people who subscribe and listen. The idea is that after this episode we're gonna take a couple months off reach out to some new guests and get some episodes in the pipeline.

Maddie (18:08.218)
Yeah.

Sean Lukasik (18:35.422)
you on monthly at that point to kind of just kind of share how we've been chronically online and what trends we're seeing and you know, talk about the things that are happening on the internet. So I think that would be a lot of fun. So as this is kind of like the last one then of 2023, I wanted to just share a few updates from some of the guests that we've had on in this first I guess you can call it like first season or whatever.

This has been such a fun project. And my very first guest was Dr. Jen Goldbeck, and she talked about working on a book about the relationships that we have with our dogs. And it's called The Purist Bond, and I know that that's out now. So that just came out a few weeks ago. My dad already has a copy of it. He shared that with me. I just shared the Kate Lindsey mug, so she only sells these a few times a year.

Maddie (19:24.268)
That's great.

Sean Lukasik (19:32.63)
Um, they're sold out now, uh, in her shop, but follow her to find out when she, when she's making more of those. Um, Franz Nicolay is the keyboard player from the hold study. And, uh, every year I go down to the city, down to Brooklyn and, uh, see them. Um, and so I just did that a couple of weeks ago at the beginning of December for their massive nights weekend, um, at the Brooklyn bowl and, uh, sorry, I didn't reach out, I know you're in the city, but it's, it's like all I could do to.

Maddie (19:59.586)
I think my back was run out anyway, so...

Sean Lukasik (20:01.958)
Well, perfect. Yeah, there you go. Um, so, uh, so yeah, Hold Steady is just wrapping up their 20th year as a band, which is pretty cool. Um, and then Tara McGowan, um, we've actually talked a little bit, um, about some of the local races that were happening here in Corning. She gave me some great advice, um, on a, uh, a county-wide campaign. And I know that she's been in touch with a close friend, kind of scheming and strategizing some ways that maybe.

courier could reach into New York State or upstate New York or, or just kind of what does upstate New York mean? I have no idea like how far along they are in those conversations. But it's kind of fun to have had the opportunity to talk with Tara, and then know that like she and one of my closest friends are thinking about how they can make positive change in New York States. That's a lot of fun. And

Yeah, so I want to ask you like if there were any episodes that resonated with you or who a more fun way to ask that would be like, who do you think would be the most fun kind of paisano to have in our life like to have at our family Christmas Eve party? Other than Maddie Masiello, she doesn't. Of course. Yeah, yeah.

Maddie (21:14.405)
That is a very fun question. I was gonna say, I think I have to mention Maddie Masiello because she is one of my real life paisanos. I think Kate honestly would be a lot of fun. I had already subscribed to her newsletter before she was on your podcast. So I think she seems very interesting. I think we'd have a lot of really interesting things to talk about. But I think everyone you've had on has been really fascinating just in different ways.

Sean Lukasik (21:33.075)
Yeah.

Sean Lukasik (21:39.134)
Yeah, I think Kate would be a lot of fun to like, have at a party and break down like how, how our family uses the internet also.

Maddie (21:41.295)
Mm-hmm.

Maddie (21:48.345)
That would be an interesting conversation to have her like MC. Because I would, I mean, our family is a lot of people a little bit older than I am up to like our parents who are in their sixties. And yeah, I've never even really thought about asking them because I think in my head, I'm like, it's just Facebook, I think. But it would be interesting to actually hear what they have to say.

Sean Lukasik (21:52.528)
Right.

Sean Lukasik (22:05.655)
Yeah.

Sean Lukasik (22:09.23)
Uh, yeah. And to have her, although if she was moderating the conversation or MCing that, that whole like foreign language effect that you were talking about earlier would probably happen. Really? They would have no idea. Half of what.

Maddie (22:21.241)
No idea. That reminds me actually of a conversation I had with my mom a few months ago. But started, I was in LA visiting a friend and there are like two tweets that my friends and I like will consistently like cry laughing over. But again, I think there are things like, you have to have been on Twitter for a while, I think to find them funny. But I was like filling my mom in, I was like, we were sitting on the ground, like in Disneyland waiting for some like.

Sean Lukasik (22:34.199)
Mm-hmm.

Maddie (22:45.361)
water show to happen and we are crying laughing over this. My mom's like, oh, well, what was it? And I read her the tweets and she, it was so, she's very sweet. She was like, oh, can you send me those? I think maybe they'd be funnier if I could read them. And I was like, you're not going to think they're funny because they're kind of not. Like you have to just get it. So yeah, I think a lot of the internet language, she would be like, what are you talking about?

Sean Lukasik (23:01.522)
No, I don't think that's gonna help.

Yeah.

Sean Lukasik (23:10.706)
It is fun when there are those moments that like, a good majority of the internet understands as a poet, like obviously there are like niche jokes and memes and things that happen all the time. But it's pretty fun. Like I'm the example you shared about like car me from the bear. I don't even feel like people necessarily need to have watched the bear. But if they were paying attention online, they would know

Maddie (23:17.412)
Mm-hmm.

Maddie (23:36.177)
Yes.

Sean Lukasik (23:37.002)
about his personality and what just generally what the show is about. So it's not as niche as like people who have seen the show. But that said, like the audience of the internet does not necessarily include everyone who, you know, uses Facebook or Instagram or just sort of, you know, the more surface level like social media and uses that we see.

Maddie (23:45.842)
Mm-hmm.

Maddie (24:05.989)
Yeah, which is I like have come up with a number of things when I was just like thinking about what is chronically online or like, how do I see it come up in my life? I have a note right now on my phone that would make no sense to anyone who is like not use social media apps. But one of the ones that I do think is pretty universal is the none pizza left beef meme that's been around for like probably a decade now. And I think there are some memes that are old enough or like they have hit a lot of the social media platforms. Like, I'm sure that one originally was like on Facebook. I've definitely seen it all over Twitter and Instagram.

Sean Lukasik (24:13.329)
Mm-hmm.

Mm.

Maddie (24:35.781)
I doubt I've made it to TikTok, but I think there are some of the older memes that have been around long enough where people are like, Oh yeah, I've seen that. Or I think about like way back when YouTube was starting to get big, probably when I was like in middle school and it was the like Charlie bit my finger or some things like that. But I do think even my mom would be like, Oh yeah.

Sean Lukasik (24:37.922)
Sure.

Sean Lukasik (24:49.924)
Oh yeah.

Sean Lukasik (24:55.198)
It's interesting to see those characters come back around to like sometimes the person or often young child who was like the butt of a joke of a popular meme. You know, you find out now that they're like 30 years old and they have a family of their own and their own kids are doing the meme and it's like weird when that stuff comes around. I mean, Charlie himself must be in like his mid 20s right like easily. And

Maddie (24:58.341)
Mm-hmm.

Maddie (25:10.269)
Mm-hmm.

I'm sorry.

Maddie (25:20.913)
Oh, easily. Yeah. It is funny too, because I think some of the really, really popular memes, you almost forget that they're a person. Like, that was a real person. Somebody really took that picture and uploaded it, and then it just went viral. And then you see them as an adult, and you're like, you lived a whole life. Meanwhile, people are still sharing the meme of you as a three-year-old making a funny face.

Sean Lukasik (25:29.908)
right.

Right.

Sean Lukasik (25:39.525)
Yeah.

Sean Lukasik (25:43.066)
And it's like I can hear that voice. I would imitate. I mean, at that time, you know, I would try to just emulate the voice. We thought it was so funny. Yeah, wild. Are you, do you spend a lot of time on YouTube?

Maddie (25:52.37)
Mm-hmm

Maddie (26:01.309)
No, I did a lot in high school. I do definitely less now. And I think when I do now, it's like I'll put on a video kind of in the background while I do like mindless types of work. I'm big on like, I don't know, food YouTube. I don't really know if it's like that's the right term for it even. But a lot of people who either like own restaurants or have their own like shows like Binging with Babish is a big one.

Sean Lukasik (26:03.476)
Mm-hmm.

Sean Lukasik (26:11.191)
Yeah.

Sean Lukasik (26:26.307)
Yep. Yeah.

Maddie (26:28.465)
the biggest one that I like kind of keep up with. Oh, New York Times, like cooking channel. But yeah.

Sean Lukasik (26:31.764)
Mm-hmm.

Mm hmm. Yeah, I asked because like that tends to be the place if I run home for lunch or if I you know, at the end of end of the day, and I'm not on my phone, I don't I still don't have cable. So I open up like my Apple TV. And I go into the YouTube app if it's not Netflix. You know, I'll check in on some sports updates. I definitely get the food YouTube stuff like binging

Maddie (26:49.629)
Hmm.

Sean Lukasik (27:01.462)
with Babish is all over my YouTube feed. Matty Matheson, Epicurious, Food Network, like yeah, New York Times, all that stuff. And then I get like this brand of content that Kate Lindsay actually referenced in our conversation where it's like a guy on a hike just like quietly or.

Maddie (27:03.081)
I'm sorry.

Hmm.

Sean Lukasik (27:28.054)
cooking, it's often outdoor related stuff. It might be like cooking a meal on a fire or building lean to or, or some most of the time just like out for a hike. And that stuff like helps me kind of decompress and, and it's also not on a tiny little screen on my phone. So I can kind of like lean back on the, on the couch or the chair. And I don't know, I've always thought like it's interesting. I don't think about

Maddie (27:33.703)
Hmm.

Sean Lukasik (27:56.122)
my YouTube use as much but like it's kind of like the way I watch the way I channel surf almost.

Maddie (28:03.877)
Yeah, that's interesting. I think YouTube, it's been interesting to watch like the evolution because when it was first big, I was probably like in middle school and then high school and it was a lot of like there were YouTubers and everyone had like their group of YouTubers that they followed. And then it seems like YouTube has become a little bit more saturated. And so I think and I think also as a lot of us have gotten older, it's like less about which YouTubers you follow and you constantly keep up with and more about kind of like the vibe that you're looking for, like the kinds of things because I

Sean Lukasik (28:08.567)
Mm-hmm.

Maddie (28:32.761)
Don't get a lot of that, like hiking, silent cooking stuff. But I do get a lot of like, I think the food videos are good, like decompression. I feel like I'm learning, but it's usually very gentle. Like, it's not very intense.

Sean Lukasik (28:43.134)
Yep. Yeah. 100%. Yeah. And that's like the same thing with the outdoors stuff. For me, it's just kind of like decompressing a little bit. So the one of the topics that you mentioned in your email, and something that I definitely wanted to touch on in this conversation is the idea of having third places online. So third places, you know, at one point being

cafes or theaters or, um, you know, wherever you might go, that's not work home or school and home. Um, and, uh, I wonder what, like, as I'm talking, like, I'm wondering if YouTube is really a third place for me, or if it's just kind of like a, a distraction or a decompression, um, but I could think of, uh, like Reddit sometimes is really a third place for me. And

Um, I wonder where, where you spend, where you feel like you're really like, um, investing your time online as, as sort of a third place.

Maddie (29:45.181)
That's a really good question. I'm not sure. I think it's like, it's in kind of a flux a little bit. I do think Twitter, although Twitter, I think I'm, that's actually cross social media right now. I feel like I'm just watching. I'm not really participating. Twitter, I think was bigger for me before. I think now, because of so many people have left Twitter, you're almost only left with the people on Twitter where you're like, oh, you need to like get outside.

Sean Lukasik (29:55.95)
Thank you.

Sean Lukasik (30:00.163)
Mm-hmm.

Sean Lukasik (30:12.828)
Yeah.

Maddie (30:14.809)
I think Reddit has been a big one. My friends recently were laughing because I feel like right now my response to everything is like, oh, let me go consult Reddit. And I know Reddit's been around forever, but I really haven't started using it until the past probably six months. But it's very helpful to go and find answers to questions. And I'm part of, actually one of my coworkers, she got off of Twitter a while ago and she was like, I did also miss the community of Twitter. And she has found a couple stand in Reddit threads that she's like, it's not the same, but it feels similar.

Sean Lukasik (30:44.258)
Yeah.

Maddie (30:45.785)
So I think there, I think it's fine. I feel like I have the same group chat across like three different social media platforms and you send them the different content depending on like which one you're on. And so I guess for me sometimes the third space is just like interacting with the same people I see all the time, just virtually. It's like continuing, like we could have three conversations going once in Twitter, once in Instagram and like once on text.

Sean Lukasik (30:52.319)
Yeah.

Sean Lukasik (30:56.02)
Yes.

Sean Lukasik (31:01.566)
Okay.

Sean Lukasik (31:09.318)
Yeah. Oh, that's an interesting way to think about that. I hadn't, I see what you mean by that now. Like where you would normally have invited your friends out for coffee and had the same conversations. Now you're, you're doing that with the same people, but across different platforms, that's interesting. Um,

Maddie (31:19.187)
Mm-hmm.

Sean Lukasik (31:30.654)
Yeah, now that yeah, I'm racing through examples of how that's true for me too. And we'll have to save that for a deeper conversation in a future episode because that's yeah, that's really interesting. What are some of the things that you think are going to be different or some of the things that have changed this year that are going to kind of like carry us into 2024?

Maddie (31:57.025)
Um, so I was looking back at the email and I think the first thing I was talking about was like phone culture. Um, I sent this email in the middle of September and since then Apple's announced that they're switching from SMS to RCS, which I personally think supports my argument. Um, I think, so I used to have an iPhone and then when I graduated college, I switched to a pixel phone, mostly because my phone had gotten stolen at a bar and I was like, now feels like a good time to try it.

Sean Lukasik (32:00.151)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, I wrote that down. Yeah.

Sean Lukasik (32:12.244)
Yeah.

Maddie (32:24.721)
And I love my Pixel. I will defend my Pixel. My friends can tell you I make all my group chats green. I'm sorry, I guess. I'm not that sorry. I love it. But I think for a long time, when I first switched, a lot of my friends genuinely were like, this is annoying. Switch back. And there was a lot of phone loyalty, especially to Apple products. I think over the past year or so, we're seeing more people, I think, be more comfortable switching to a Samsung phone.

Sean Lukasik (32:39.851)
Yeah.

Maddie (32:54.209)
or a Pixel phone or just be less attached to the idea of their iPhone. I think part of it is like, I've heard a lot of conversations around, I think Apple's kind of like, what really is the difference between their last three versions of their phone? Like it's more expensive, nothing's really changed. I think also with a switch to RCS, it'll be easier for people. I don't know what's gonna happen with the green text bubble, but I think if that changes, which I feel like it might.

Sean Lukasik (33:08.511)
Right.

Sean Lukasik (33:17.016)
Yeah.

Maddie (33:21.309)
Because I think there's like a big social part, I think, of having an iPhone and being part of group chats that you can name and everyone has a group or the blue check boxes or text boxes. You can react to things, which I can react to things too. It just like shows up differently, but it's more integrated if everyone's on an iPhone. I think about changes where everyone can do everything. People are gonna be like, well then why do I have an iPhone? Why don't I switch? Especially like as all of the people who I think it was most important, like I think.

Sean Lukasik (33:29.729)
Yeah.

Sean Lukasik (33:40.972)
Mm-hmm.

Right.

Maddie (33:49.501)
people my age, it was really important too, because we were all in high school and iPhones were getting big. So it was like, I think the social aspect was amplified. But now we're all gonna day towards like, you buy your own phones now. So if once a couple hundred dollars cheaper, there's not really a difference. So I think we're gonna see that changing. I also think, slightly shamefully, I am part of like the K-pop fandom, which is a whole other conversation, but I've seen a lot recently, Samsung's a Korean company. They have a lot of...

Sean Lukasik (34:02.583)
Right.

Sean Lukasik (34:10.066)
Awesome. Yeah.

Sean Lukasik (34:17.43)
Mm-hmm.

Maddie (34:18.377)
Korean groups advertising Samsung. And so I think for younger generations where K-pop is like really huge right now, they're probably gonna be less attached to the iPhone. And if your favorite idols are advertising like their Samsung phones, I think it's way more appealing to be like, oh, well, let me just try this one out. I also think Samsung innovates a little bit. It was a little bit bolder in their innovation recently. They have like the flip phones. I think they're gonna keep iterating on that. And so I think if you see Samsung doing new and interesting things, and iPhone is still just like your slab, it's like...

Sean Lukasik (34:30.173)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Sean Lukasik (34:41.512)
Mm-hmm.

Maddie (34:48.625)
not really changing all that much. I think it'll change a little bit.

Sean Lukasik (34:49.99)
Yeah. Well, I wrote down the same sort of changing trend because it was interesting that you brought that up and it has since changed. So I don't really have anything to even add to that. Like I think those are all really interesting points to think about. Um, but I do have to share this anecdote where we had a group chat, um, several years ago and, uh, one member was an Android user and, uh,

He didn't understand, he thought that we were all typing out like as if it was internet lingo. He thought we were saying like, Sean laughed at that or Sean liked that. And so he would speak about himself in the third person and say like the same things, but he would change it slightly. He would say, you know, like, Sean laughed at everything above.

Maddie (35:28.389)
Hahaha

Maddie (35:43.677)
Ha ha ha!

Sean Lukasik (35:44.402)
or like Sean really liked the, you know, he would add little adjectives and things and it was really fun and funny to see. And, but he wasn't like in on the joke, but it was so like, uh, wholesome and, uh, that he was like taking the time to type that out. Uh, so yeah, it is unfortunate that we won't, uh, get to see his, his use of. You know, being an Android user in the group chat anymore. Um,

Maddie (35:51.13)
I'm gonna go.

Sean Lukasik (36:13.606)
But yeah, and I also jotted down, like, the privacy thing, just with a question mark, because that's always a conversation. I just talked about it the other day, about how like WhatsApp is outrageously popular in other countries and continents around the world, but not in the US. Mostly

in other countries because they really stress privacy and all of those messages and things are encrypted and WhatsApp. Um, and so I would love to see that. Encryption come either into general text messaging or either more use on WhatsApp or more of an emphasis on, um, encrypted, uh, web surfing, conversations, photo sharing, whatever it may be, because, um, I think we've got to keep taking steps towards.

privacy in this country. Um, and it has nothing to do with like the TikTok political conversations. It's just, um, you know, it's a little bit scary what some of these companies have access to and, um, and what they're able and willing to share. Um, and so, uh, so yeah, I, I hope to say, I don't necessarily have reason to believe that we'll make great strides in privacy on the internet, um, in 2024, but just something that I kind of hope to see as well.

Maddie (37:33.113)
Yeah, I agree. I think that's one of those topics that like I know a little bit about, but not very much. But I think generally you could say most Americans don't know a ton about like privacy on the Internet. Or I think also because so much of it is just like it happens and you hear about it retrospectively and you're like, well, everyone has all my data anyways. And it's like, maybe we shouldn't be so blase about that. I know there was an article that came out last week that got very little attention, but it's how

Sean Lukasik (37:52.854)
Yeah.

Maddie (37:59.997)
government, like our government, but also foreign governments have information. I should check this, but it's like, it's related to push notifications. Yeah.

Sean Lukasik (38:10.302)
Yes, right, right. They have to be approved by the federal government, like push notifications don't necessarily just come, you know, from the app. It's I mean, they come from the app, but they get approved and routed through federal like agency or something. Yeah.

Maddie (38:28.145)
Right. Which like that's... I don't know. Like that's one of those things where I'm like, I don't... Am I going to turn off all my push notifications? Maybe. But also, like, I don't know. But yeah, I think should probably be more like education around privacy. Definitely push for it. I do think RCS messages are encrypted. So I think that's the reason Apple's switching to it is because Europe kind of got on them about a lot of privacy stuff. And then I think also...

Sean Lukasik (38:35.435)
Right.

Sean Lukasik (38:42.56)
Yeah.

Sean Lukasik (38:47.946)
Yeah, oh, that'd be great.

Maddie (38:57.769)
I think just like poor business practices because I know they're changing their.

where you plug your phone in, I can't remember the word for it. Like the charger. Yeah.

Sean Lukasik (39:04.658)
Oh, that's right. Yeah. The right, right. Um, again, but yeah, hopefully once and for all. Um, yeah, well, you know, all remains to be seen. Um, I, I really appreciate having this conversation. I'm excited to do it a lot more in 2024. That's a trend that we know will change. Um, and, uh, for, for everyone listening, um, you know, thank you for

Maddie (39:24.169)
Thanks for watching!

Sean Lukasik (39:29.286)
supporting this little project of mine, and now of Maddie's as well. And doing the Paisanos podcast has been a lot of fun in 2023. And if you haven't had a chance to listen to all of the conversations that I've had so far this year, please go back and do that. You'll have a couple of months while we're looking for some new guests and things. Of course, if you have guest ideas, email me.

Maddie (39:34.301)
Hehehehe

Sean Lukasik (39:56.622)
And topic ideas. Um, and, uh, and yeah, I hope everyone just has a great holiday and new year. Um, and Maddie, I'm sure I'll see you in Buffalo at some point. Awesome. Well, thank you.

Maddie (40:06.213)
Yeah, I'll see you there.

Yeah, thank you for having me.