In this economy, who doesn’t need a couple extra bucks these days? I’ll tell you who, that silver spooned trust fund baby wearing $4000 sneakers that complete the $8300 “homeless chic” look. Wouldn’t it be nice if you could get a little taste of that feeling where you aren’t thinking about how much cash is in the bank each time you swipe your debit card buying avocado toast? Well, the simple answer is you setup a legal scam and let them buy into it. But not just any scam. It’s got to get these rich kids to drool.

Well, a ponzi scheme is easy pickings for dumb 20 year olds with too much cash, but you’re nowhere near as smart as Bernie Madoff and that kinda crap landed even him in jail. Hold them hostage? Nah, that never works out all that well. We need something that’s going to pull at their heartstrings, open their wallets, and create some top-tier content for their Instagram and dating profile photos. I’ve got it!

Chances are that you, one of your children, or at very least someone you know is taking school classes online. This number has obviously exploded with the pandemic and basically the entirety of the world’s schooling being virtual, however at this point we’re more or less “back to normal”. Prior to the pandemic there absolutely was e-learning software out there, but for obvious reasons they’ve become far more prevalent since March 2020.

Enter Lanschool. A program initially developed in the 80’s, but really went into the modern era in 2018 with their “Lanschool Air” version. Think of their classic program as being a parental control program on a computer, but their “air” version being exactly the same only it’s completely remotely administered. Oh, and it’s also got a really cool feature that allows the “teacher” to have complete control over the user’s computer. Yes that’s right, they can secretly enable microphones, the webcam, have full access to view, edit, and deleted your files – heck, they can even add ones of their own! They can log all of your keystrokes, meaning that they can even record all of your usernames/passwords, or credit card information, all in the background. Simply put, Lanschool is a completely evil tool and you need to be aware of what you’re giving someone access to if you’ve got it installed on any of your devices.

Back in July 2020 I wrote a long winded Facebook post about why TikTok was basically a virus that you gladly implanted into your life, and why it should be deleted immediately. The post came with a lot of reactions such as “I don’t care”, “I like the dances!”, and other completely checked out replies. A few people seemed concerned, but I’d be curious as to how many actually deleted the app from their devices. That post is forever lost when I deleted my old Facebook account, hence why it’s not linked here.

I wrote that diatribe a few days before it hit more mainstream media. I read a lot of security and tech blogs, which is where this info I was sharing was initially disclosed. Basically some guy reverse engineered the app and dug around it’s source code to look into what it was doing. The gist is that it’s run by the Chinese Government, the app collects everything about you it possibly can, has tons of very concerning back-doors into your device, and now… there’s more.

You seriously need to delete this app. And I’m going to tell you why.

It’s the second time in my life I’ve been scared as all hell, yet excited for the future when it came to my career. The first time was in late October 2009. I was working at Primus Telecom where I was totally kicking butt in their tech support department. On one overcast late September evening I met an old colleague [Jessica] for a drink to “catch up”. As our second drink came to the table, as too did a man that looked as if he’d be a shoe-in for a role as “nightclub security”, only instead of “SECURITY” on his shirt, it read “RUN BGP”. Truthfully, it could have also read “RTFM ID10T” as both would have been predictable should you know Scott Silzer.

Jessica introduced Scott as her colleague, as he sat down and said “So Paul, do you like your job?”… “uhh, ya, why?”… “Well, you see.. would you like to talk about a new job?”… “umm.. not really”. Scott gets up and talks to Purdy (the _best_ bartender in the world, I’ll add) “get him another one”. A fresh beer arrives. “Paul, now that you have another beer, let’s talk about your new job”. This wasn’t a question, it was a demand. From an intimidating man. The kind of man you just hand your ID to without question. “Ok, what about it?”. This started something…..

“NO!!!!!!” they cried. A whole 4 people cared, and I’m most certainly being generous with that number. I’m not sure anyone would care, and if they do, why? The thing is, I see myself as someone who took a lot of pleasure and joy out of playing music; getting the chance to do that in front of a crowd was just that pleasure on an elevated level. I’m a 39 year old dude who’s been doing this DJ thing for some 26 odd years of my life, and I’m not even “over the hill”. DJing is engrained into my very being as a person and has shaped a considerable part of my life, despite the fact I always saw it as a hobby. There was a time when I was being flown into the USA on a regular basis to play shows to progressively bigger and more insane crowds. Any DJ who’s been there will attest there’s a certain magic felt when you tear down a room of 3500 to pieces ever so meticulously; a crowd like that shall never be wasted. And, there was a time where I’d be on the lineup where absolutely nobody cared (not even me). Funny how everything comes full circle. But, my time is done and that’s OK.

Maybe you’ve been there, I certainly have. For a couple years in my early 20’s I had my credit cards maxed out, a couple bucks in the bank, and a shitty job that was paying me $1000/month base + extra as we did gigs. We were doing well for a while, until the owner decided his affair was more important than the business, and suddenly the “extras” dried up. The $1000/mo was something I’d have to beg him for in the last hours of the 30th of the month so I could pay the minimums on my credit cards. Debt piled up within a few months and suddenly I was poor. I managed to find myself a new job paying $30k/year, but it was a 2.5 hour commute each way by public transit – the only thing I could afford as my car was broken and I literally had nothing left. I was living on little more than ramen and what my mom would leave for me as leftovers.

I hated her at the time for not lending me money just to buy a bus pass promising I’d pay her as soon as I got my first cheque. Instead she made me sell one of the only things I owed that had any value to scrape together literally the last few bucks to get myself to work. That was a really shitty 2 weeks until I had just enough to buy myself some lunch. The thing was – I had it easy compared to most. Oh, the lesson that she taught me. Hated her then, SO grateful for her lessons now.