The Nostalgic Nerds Podcast
The Nostalgic Nerds Podcast, where we take a deep dive into geek culture, tech evolution, and the impact of the past on today’s digital world.
Episodes
22 episodes
Elastic Hearts (Oh, Vulcanised Rubber)
Elastic Hears (Oh, Vulcanised Rubber)[Verse]Born from heat and sulfur’s kissA miracle we can’t dismissTougher than the strongest threadHolds the world where we tread[Chorus]Oh vulcanised rubber you keep us ali...
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Season 1
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Episode 17
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2:21
S1E17 - Built on Rubber!
Quick note - a few audio drop outs here and there. Tried to edit around them, but nothing too serious and you'll get the gist in all the spots with issues. Rubber is one of those materials we almost never think about, right up unti...
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Season 1
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Episode 17
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27:13
Steel Titans of the World - An Ode to Shipping Containers
Just a bit of fun from Renee and I. If you're a listener, you know that Marc believes that double-entry bookkeeping might be the most important technological innovation ever. But...just maybe...he's willing to concede that the venerable Shippin...
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Season 1
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Episode 16
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4:34
S1E16 - The (Shipping) Container Monologues
Everyone loves fast delivery, but nobody loves thinking about how it works. In this episode, we dig into the overlooked story of logistics: the steam engines that kicked it off, the wars that reinvented it, the barcodes and warehouses that scal...
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Season 1
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Episode 16
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54:48
S1E15 - Bubbles Build the Big Stuff: How Overhyped Tech Leaves Us Infrastructure We Rely On
Come for the canals and railroads. Stay for the part where Marc and Renee admit AI might just be the next overbuilt mess we rely on.In this episode, we explore the historical patterns of infrastructure bubbles, revealing how emerging tec...
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Season 1
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Episode 15
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1:00:16
Bubbles Build the Big Stuff (Trailer)
Come for the canals and railroads. Stay for the part where Marc and Renee admit AI might just be the next overbuilt mess we rely on.
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Season 1
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Episode 15
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0:26
S1E14 - Cinema Reels and Digital Revolutions
Cinema is built on technology, from the shape of the very first movie frame to the LED walls and AI tools used today. In this episode, Marc and Renee explore how film evolved in both sight and sound, and how the industry kept reinventing the mo...
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Season 1
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Episode 14
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55:02
Cinema Reels and Digital Revolutions (Trailer)
Hollywood has tried every trick to keep us in the dark, from anamorphic lenses to lasers and LED walls. Renee and Marc unpack a century of cinema tech and ask what's the next spectacle that will draw audiences?Tune in tomorrow for the fu...
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Season 1
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Episode 14
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0:29
Please Enter Your Password...Again (trailer)
Just a bit of B roll from Renee's story about Russian's listening in to her recording.
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Season 1
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Episode 13
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0:47
S1E13 - Please Enter Your Password… Again
Renee and Marc break down the evolution of authentication in recent times. RSA tokens. The rise of mobile authenticators. The not-so-long, painful reign of SMS codes.They move through SIM swapping, behavioral biometrics, and the shift towar...
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Season 1
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Episode 13
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33:04
S1E12 - From Shells to Stablecoins: The Tech of Money
Marc once again drags Renee into a museum. This time the “Hall of Money." Five thousand years of humans trying (and mostly failing) to automate trust. From clay tablets that doubled as IOUs to Renaissance double-entry bookkeeping, colonial funn...
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Season 1
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Episode 12
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1:22:00
S1E11 Tech Ethics: A Short History of Doing It Anyway
Warning up front - we discuss some ethical conundrums and situations with tech. There's one mention of suicide and we talk about the Manhattan Project. We're respectful, but we just wanted to put it out there. Every breakthrough in...
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Season 1
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Episode 11
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52:36
S1E10 - Your Printer Hates You. And Now It Can Build Things
Printers used to be the villains of the office...loud, cranky, and prone to eating your best work right before a deadline. But somewhere between the screech of a dot matrix and the hiss of a resin vat, something changed. Printing got interestin...
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Season 1
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Episode 10
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55:39
S1E8b - Barnum Would’ve Loved the Bots: The Digital Freakshow (Part 2)
Welcome to the second half of our big-top breakdown, where the circus goes digital, and the clowns have ring lights. Wait...did we just call ourselves clowns? Marc and Renee dive into the wild world of influencer culture, brand risk...
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Season 1
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Episode 9
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33:43
S1E8 - Barnum Would’ve Loved the Bots: The Rise of Agentic Advertising Part 1
Step right up and join Marc and Renee in this captivating episode of The Nostalgic Nerds Podcast where they embark on an exhilarating journey exploring the interplay between the magnificent world of P.T. Barnum's 19th-century circus and the hig...
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Season 1
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Episode 8
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46:59
S1E6b - Throughput, Thrills, and Theme Parks
This is Part 2 of our 2 part Theme Park episode!Roller coasters and databases have the same issues: concurrency, throughput, and panic when things go wrong. Theme parks are basically enterprise technology, just with more churros and slig...
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Season 1
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Episode 7
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45:29
S1E6a - Throughput, Thrills, and Theme Parks
Roller coasters and databases have the same issues: concurrency, throughput, and panic when things go wrong. Theme parks are basically enterprise technology, just with more churros and slightly fewer COBOL programmers.Join Renee and Marc...
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Season 1
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Episode 6
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56:30
S1E5 - From Clippy to Agentic AI
From Clippy’s awkward pop-ups to agentic AI plotting your next conquest, Marc and Renee laugh through the evolution of digital assistants. Annoying, nostalgic, and now maybe just a little too smart.Hop on the nostalgia train! This...
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Season 1
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Episode 5
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41:27
S1E4 - Bat Boy and How Algorithms Ate the Urban Legend
Hold onto your tabloids! This week on the Nostalgic Nerds Podcast, Renee Murphy and Marc Massar explore the wild frontier where technology meets misinformation, tracing the outrageous claims that have captivated audiences across decades.Fro...
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Season 1
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Episode 4
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52:06
S1E3 - Sears, Amazon, and the Eternal Catalog
To answer the burning questions from the episode - Could you buy dogs from the Sears catalog? Yes.Could you buy narcotics from the Sears catalog? Yes.How does Renee pronounce "downtown?" Well, listen in.By the 1970's Sears ...
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Season 1
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Episode 3
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39:10
S1E2 - Your Own Hyperlocal Meteorologist in Your Pocket - The Nostalgic Nerds Podcast
Tune in for hot takes, cold fronts, and a 70% chance of questionable metaphors.In this episode, Renee and Marc of the Nostalgic Nerds Podcast take you on a trip through the evolution of weather forecasting. From the nostalgic days of dia...
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Season 1
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Episode 2
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38:51
The Nostalgic Nerds Podcast - The AI Gigawatt Hunger
Great Scott! 150 NFL Football Stadiums running at night - all at the same time. That's how much energy a new Wyoming AI data center is chugging. 1.81 Gigawatts. Just think what Doc Brown would say about that.Join Renee and Marc on...
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Season 1
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Episode 1
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47:46