But both Greg and Alex being in house and Justine on Skype makes it worse, as what Justine hears and her contribution is delayed. You notice a few occasions where Alex asks Justine a short question direct with no warning and there’s approx a quarter-second pause before she acknowledges and starts to reply. I was trying to imagine being involved in a 3-hour debate where my audio was delayed. Don’t think I could cope with it.
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Aha, okay. I only heard the audio and assumed that both Greg and Justine were on Skype as he is a Pommozzie.
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I think he lives in Cheltenham in the UK, where I was born. I now live in Adelaide, Australia, where Greg is from!
You and Greg changed places.
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That explains a lot! An Ozziepomm and Pommozzie! 
I worked in Cheltenham for a while, and no, not for Reader’s Digest!
I’m now a Tommykraut or Inselaffekraut. (Tommy is slang for British, coming from the second World War slang for British soldiers, Inselaffe is literally “island monkey” and Kraut is, naturally, English slang for Germans)
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Totally this. There’s a reason Leo makes hosting look easy, and it’s not because it is easy. 
I think this is one episode to chalk up to experience - learn lessons, move on, that sort of thing. There were some interesting topics covered, despite the issues.
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Well, I’ll be a contrarian here, as I don’t really find Greg annoying, he’s just opinionated and slightly brash, not dissimilar to the lovable Jeff Jarvis. He is apparently a computer networking professional, so I assume what he said have some teeth, but what do I know.
In the beginning where the topics discussed were his area of knowledge and expertise, he wanted to say his piece, why not. Later on when Alex and Justine were talking about video editing, Photoshop etc, which is not Greg’s area, he kept quiet and was even trying to ask for opinion and advice from Justine. So is not all bad.
By the way, I valued Karsten’s input as he’s pretty knowledgeable, even Leo says so often. A lot of time, Leo et al rely on the chat room to provide some info, so Karsten is just doing something similar, I don’t find it distracting at all.
Interesting discussion, love it! 
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Wow - a long time and very active listener, but finally joined the twit community.
I didn’t read all of the comments, but just adding mine.
Alex did great job
Didn’t agree with Greg Ferro much, although he had a few good points
What I didn’t agree with:
- That governments are more efficient than private companies…as private companies have much more pressure to be efficient – or they go out of business. I thought this was very funny that he thought governments were so efficient – as everyone I know says how inefficient they are.
- That Government only health care would best. I’m not expert in this, but I’ve only heard of long waits for service in UK for health care. Look at VA – how efficient is that in delivering Health Care. Again Government vs. Private.
- The whole discussion on drones – as the companies looking into using them wouldn’t do it if it wasn’t going to be cost effectives – and i guess we’ll see where it might work when they roll it out.
- Greg’s strong opinions against large companies. Obviously there is wasted efficiency in large companies, but they wouldn’t stay in business if they aren’t somewhat efficient.
Interesting Points from Greg:
- How so much money in healthcare is spent in final six months of life. I personally would not want to cost my children any money if i have Alzheimers…
- He mentioned Australian Healthcare system – so I will look into that
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I agree. I usually enjoy his input into the various shows. Sometimes it seems Leo gets a little annoyed by it, which seems weird. He’s the boss…could just tell him not to do it.
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A number of people here have mentioned how much the host plays a role in moderating the conversation during the show—and how much of a skill it is to do so. Which is why I generally skip TWiT on the weeks that Leo is away (unless another really skilled moderator plays host—my personal favorites are Becky Worley and Molly Wood). I started listening to this week’s episode after reading some of the comments here, but after about 25 minutes, I gave up.
I was going to post this as a separate topic, but thought I’d get steamrolled by doing so. Does anyone else skip the weeks when Leo is out?
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Sorry, I’m in agreement with the crowd it seems, Greg was talking over everyone. Hated it. First time ever I stopped listening to a show. He wouldn’t even listen to Karsten, who is really smart and had good points. I don’t mind if someone plays devil’s advocate but this was down right rude and not informative. Hope this doesn’t happen anymore.
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I love Becky!!! Wish we’d get more of her.
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Yup - like many others I couldn’t finish this episode. I cannot stand it when you have 2-3 people talking over one another. The latency issue with Justine was bad - not her fault obviously. It’s happens with other shows and guests all the time, it just seemed so much worse this time around (and it didn’t help that Greg felt he needed to have the show all to himself). But if they know latency is going to be a big issue with a guest, maybe they need to abandon Skype and use audio-only VoIP.
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This may not be the best place or time to observe this, but I don’t see why when a show features parties who all have Apple hardware, TWiT doesn’t use FaceTime. Of course latency is beyond their control, but seems like it’d be least there.
Totally agree about Becky Worley. I know the show is going to be awesome when she’s on. Host or guest.
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I wouldn’t say that governments are more efficient than private companies, but I’ve always trusted them more than private companies, but thereagain, I grew up in countries where the government protected its citizens from the excesses of big business…
The advantage of government healthcare is that everybody gets healthcare, there is no issue of whether you have health insurance or not, you are alive and live in the country? You are covered. Everybody pays a set percentage of their income for the insurance, it is basically just another tax. The problem is that the government has to invest that money in healthcare. In the UK it ran very well for decades, then they started to privatise parts of the NHS and made them turn a profit, whilst at the same time cutting funding.
Here, in Germany, it is a hybrid system, you have to have health insurance and your employer has to pay for you, it is monitored and the payments and the spending is under government monitoring, but run by not-for-profits. If you are unemployed, the government covers your payments. What there isn’t, based on either of these systems, is higher payments depending on your health, it is based on your income. That meant, when I was a kid and a student, I got free healthcare, when I started work, it was taken out of my salary as a percentage of what I earned, the employer had to also pay their share. As I earned more, I paid more. When I was out of work, I was still covered.
The UK system went down hill. When I was a kid, I had a pain in my hip. I got an appointment with the specialist within a week and after I saw him, I was 100 miles away in London in a hospital waiting for an operation on the same afternoon!
In the early 2000s my mother had to wait a year to get on the waiting list to see a consultant for a new hip, because the consultant’s waiting list make you wait a maximum of a year to see him, this list was monitored by the government - therefore the consultants ran their official waiting list and a waiting list to get on the waiting list. She had to wait another year for the operation.
In Germany I needed an operation. I got an appointment within a week, I saw the doctor and he asked me if I was ready to go up to the ward! I hadn’t expected that quick a response. I had to put him off to the next day, because I wasn’t prepared and had to go home get a bag packed and get someone to drive me back to the hospital - paying parking for a week would have be astronomical. The German system isn’t perfect, but it is a lot better than the UK and it is streets ahead of the US situation.
The system can be run well, as long as the government doesn’t divert the funds they raise for healthcare into other “projects”, which is what caused the problems over the 90s and 2000s in the UK and it still hasn’t recovered.
You have to stop looking at US examples. Look at examples around the world, where public healthcare has been implemented well.
The last 6 months argument - you have paid into the system throughout your life, so there is no problem with the last 6 months costing money, think of all the years the majority of people pay into the system and don’t use any services.
Drones here are moot. You can’t fly them in residential or industrial areas, you have to fly them over model aircraft aerodromes or in the countryside.
Big business is a whole different matter. They have a whole bag of problems, mainly because they are too big to fail and because they have so much lobbying power. Government is supposed to be there to represent the people, but, especially in the USA, it represents the biggest checkbook.
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This was also a my first time stopping a show. I almost did it another time Greg was on, but he was handled.
Sounds like the rest of the topics were interesting, but I’ll never know.
No more Greg please
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I thought it was a great show - great conversation about all the topics. Thank you.
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TWiT is one of my commute shows. After a long day at the office, I made it through about 25 minutes and had to shut off this episode. I’ve never really had an issue with any other Non-Leo episodes, they tend to have a fun “while the cat’s away” vibe to them. This one just had a bit too ‘mean’ a spirit to it.
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Agreed, Greg comes across as an arrogant know-it-all and makes it hard to listen to. I stopped less than half way through. Episodes with him are the only ones I skip.
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