Alright time to sum up things I’ve gotten done.

I’ve been watching with alarm YouTubes decline. There are some really positive points to it. These include classic cinema movies and, of course, do-it-yourself fixes for items. However, ongoing gaslighting by actors will cause a great deal of damage. Rage baiting is huge and viewers don’t seem to know what it is. People will create a false story about perhaps losing foodstamps for her 6 kids because she has a new Mercedes. This is done to get more views and subscribers. Other channels then do reaction videos to that rage bait video and it’s viral.

First I have to say that this year I had to offload friends. They bought into Qanon and embraced a mentally ill president. My shunning wasn’t a result of their vote. It was their persistent attempts to sell me on how wrong I was not to see their point of view. They insisted there was something wrong with my thinking. In spite of asking in many different ways to stop, they continued to espouse crazy ideas. The comments I would hear were directly from Qanon playbook.

Ok, so what has this to do with YouTube? Recently I saw videos that were supposed to be representing George Will, pontificating on political ideas. I am generally adept at quickly recognizing deceit. I saw these videos coming from different YouTube platforms. I presumed they were deepfakes. I imagined that a great many viewers with motivational biases would not see the deception or even care. If you need help with making rational decisions, Snopes is a great website. It can help you, and here is the submission on George Wills videos.

The same is true of George Conway and a host of others. If you are curious as to how this works, look up FIVERR. You can get people to do anything for a buck or 5 bucks. Need YouTube views and subscribers? You can buy them. Need reviews to your product? You can buy them. Want your video distributed by many other YouTube channels and other video sharing sites? You can buy that. Out of Isreal because of course. I know a Private investigator so bad at his job he had many bad reviews on Google. He paid FIVERR to create new positive reviews. For what it’s worth, the Attorney general will slap you for doing this if they find out.

Many people from all over the world are trying to influence my thinking. People like my neighbor/friend are going to buy into the BS and spread the word like evangelicals. So I cast them out. “Satan get thee behind me and don’t push.” (Stymie Beard). I deleted YouTube as an app on all devices. I also unsubscribed from YouTube Premium. This included YouTube music, which honestly I didn’t use that much. I saved myself $12.99 a month and maybe my sanity, for whatever that is worth.

Amazon is really dangerous and the scientists there have addiction down to a science. I am bombarded with adds all day homing in on things I have looked at or purchased before. How many head phones do I need? Smart watches? Recently I’m being invited to join that new interactive AI that has conversations with you. I have trouble with Alexa turning off the lights upon command. Now they want me to jump into another broken ecosystem for $19.00 a month? I’m still angry they performed a bait and switch with the tab 8HD. It used to have a show function. This is until they came out with other show models they wanted to push so they disabled that function. Now it’s just a inadequate 8 inch tablet.

Want to know more? Here’s a pretty good documentary about it. The tablet has been hidden away in a cabinet and the apps have been uninstalled on all devices. The 10 inch show in the bedroom has been disconnected. I canceled my subscription to Amazon unlimited music. It really had a lot of benefits. However, I am pretty sure I can’t hear the difference between 24 bit and 16 bit music. I have dozens of audio books purchased through Audible. I only use that service to listen to those books.

I also canceled the Kindle unlimited plan. Yeah I read, but later in this diatribe I will tell you what I use and why. The cancellations saved me $12.00 for unlimited music and the same I think for Kindle unlimited. $24.00.

For my viewing pleasure I have IPTV. I think it has over 5k channels. I don’t know how many movies and series it includes. $15.00 a month. I can record and watch 4 different games at a time. Since fiber optic install it’s pretty reliable. What I did do to this though is I unloaded ABC, CBS, NBC and FOX. Why?

ABC paid millions of dollars to Trump. George Stepanopoulos caused this by using the word “rape” instead of “sexual assault.” He is a wordsmith and understands the difference. He prefers to use the harsher phrase because it will elicit more visceral reactions from the viewing audience. This happened at a time when ABC was up for sale.

CBS because they paid Trump millions when he extorted them over Kamela Harris interview. They canceled the 60 minutes segment on Cecot. I’m still upset about 60 minutes and the big tobacco cover-up. I’ll miss you Margarete Brennen.

Fox because they are the Trump propaganda channel. There’s so many things to say about them. I started my dislike when Kari Lake was a local anchor. I thought she was an idiot and still think so.

NBC just because. If I had to throw a dart, Joe Scarsborough bent the knee to Trump. His bobble head sock puppet Mika also did the same.

So what did I keep? Right now I’m listening to classical guitar channel on Sirius/XM. The steaming service has hundred of channels, many commercial free. If you haven’t explored this option do so. I pay $5.99 a month and the app is on all my devices. In the mornings it’s BBC world service and later who knows. It’s not lossless music but like I said before, I can’t tell the difference.

If you have a library card, you can listen to free music on Freegal Music. I suggest you get one. Lots of choices here and you can download 5 mp3 tracks a week.

An app I picked up from an AARP article is Hoopla. Again free with library card. Many movies, ebooks, audiobooks, courses, comics and magazines. I just borrowed The Book of Enoch and listened to Buckingham Nicks album. Classic Dr. Who.

Libby is an Overdrive app that allows borrowing ebooks, audiobooks and magazines. Many of the books can be opened through Kindle if that’s your prefered method. I have many magazines that come in to my personal library and I am sent a notice they are downloaded.

Another library card benefit is Kanopy. Lots of movies and television series. 20 years ago I’d go down the block to the library and check out DVDs. Remember The Prisoner or Danger Man? Redbox didn’t have those.

Project Gutenberg has over 75,000 free ebooks in both Kindle and Epub format. No library card is needed.

I haven’t turned on the TV today yet and that’s a good start. When I’m done here, I’ll read then finish the dishes and get on my new recumbent stationary bike. I got this because my hips and knees are getting worst and I have to find a way. I’m not sure this is it.