Pod Insights Pablo Torre Finds Out Tearin' Up My Charts: How MTV's "Total Request Live" Got Rigged (PTFO Vault) About this episode The "TRL" countdown was America's high-school cafeteria — a daily election of cool. Until one fateful day, when a chain letter set off a movement to hack the vote. Correspondent Yourgo Artsitas helps us investigate whether MTV's shadow government was protecting the sanctity of our culture... with a lie.
(This episode originally aired on March 12, 2024.)
• TR(ol)L: New Kids on the Block, Total Request Live and The Chain Letter That Changed the Internet
https://trolldoc.com/
• Pablo Torre Finds Out Substack
www.pablo.show
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy https://acast.com/privacy for more information.
Transcript 0:00 Speaker 00 Network freedom and flexibility. That's what you want in a healthcare plan. With a Humana Medicare Advantage PPO plan, you can see any doctor in the country who accepts Medicare, including specialists. No referrals. No kidding. Learn more at gethumana.com. See any doctor who accepts Medicare and is willing to bill Humana. Humana PPOs may not be available in all areas. Benefits and costs share may vary. Humana is a Medicare Advantage PPO organization with a Medicare contract. Enrollment in any Humana plan depends on contract renewal.
0:32 Speaker 01 This episode is brought to you by apollo.io. A lot of the stories on this show start the same way. Something that looks pretty simple turns out to be a mess once you look under the hood. Well, it's no different in the sales world. Your team has a tool for finding prospects, a different tool for reaching out to them, and a third for keeping track of it all. On paper, that's a system. In practice, it's a salesperson spending the better part of the day copying names from one tab into another and not much of it actually selling. Apollo.io is a platform that helps sales teams find the right buyers and reach out to them. It brings prospecting, outreach, and follow-up into one place instead of several separate tools. It's used by sales teams of all sizes,
1:16 Speaker 01 from small businesses to larger organizations, and it's built for teams who want less manual busywork and more time with buyers. If your marketing and sales teams are trying to work from the same view of the customer, it's worth a look. Sign up for free at apollo.io. That's apollo.io. Okay, so hello, it is me Pablo, entering, invading even your ears because I have done something I have not done before, which is take the advice of someone who once told me that if people wish to support you financially, if they wish to support your journalism, your very strange future of journalism, meaning your newsroom, your ambitions, your desire to investigate things people don't want you to investigate,
2:01 Speaker 01 you should let them. And so I am on Substack, my newsletter at www.pablo.show. We'll put a link in the show notes of this episode. I have turned on paid subscriptions. And if you didn't know, I have a Substack. Guess what? It's free and that's still there for you and it's worth it. But the paid subscribers who support this show and us will get legitimately cool, personalized benefits to come. We will make it worth your while. We are figuring out here at PTFO our post-Draft Kings future. And, you know, more good news on that front, I hope to come. But in the meantime, pablo.show is where you sign up. Click the link in the show notes. Help support us, please.
2:46 Speaker 01 Thank you, thank you, thank you on that front. And this, this episode today is a handpicked episode from deep inside the PTFO vault that we sincerely hope you enjoy.
3:00 Speaker 01 Welcome to Pablo Torre Finds Out. I am Pablo Torre and today we're going to find out what this sound is.
3:06 Speaker 02 Today's show, folks, brace yourselves. If there's a railing or a wall or a post of some kind for you to hold on to, I urge you to do so.
3:13 Speaker 01 Right after this ad.
3:26 Speaker 01 So we haven't done this before.
3:32 Speaker 01 I feel like this is a first. Bring the studio to the middle of Times Square.
3:37 Speaker 01 You dragged me out of the studio to go on a pilgrimage? That's right. And, and what was the language you used to describe where we're headed? A landmark of democracy.
3:49 Speaker 01 And the reason why I wanted you, Bradley Campbell, noted Pablo Torre Finds Out correspondent. Hello. The reason I wanted you to be doing this episode is because I wanted to do an episode about democracy and sports democracy in specific because it's an election year and the power of the vote in sports is a story. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. And so I had this meeting, those sorts of meetings that I have about ideas. You were there. Cortez was.
4:14 Speaker 03 Pitching something about Pat Riley.
4:16 Speaker 01 He was hitting his ooze tanker in the corner.
4:18 Speaker 03 Yeah.
4:18 Speaker 01 Just vaping.
4:21 Speaker 01 But the thing about it is, I immediately went to just like NBA All-Star voting.
4:26 Speaker 03 Yes.
4:26 Speaker 01 Because there are some amazing stories about
4:28 Speaker 03 Oh, yeah, yeah.
4:29 Speaker 01 Just democratic movements to get guys into the All-Star game. And this is my favorite NBA All-Star voting story. 2016, another presidential election year.
4:37 Speaker 03 Okay.
4:39 Speaker 01 Zaza Pachulia becomes the subject of an internet movement to make him an NBA All-Star. You may recall Bradley
4:47 Speaker 03 Tower Tbilisi.
4:48 Speaker 01 From the Republic of Georgia.
4:49 Speaker 03 Yeah.
4:49 Speaker 01 Big man, then with the Dallas Mavericks. It's kind of insane that he would be an NBA All-Star. He's not that good. But what happens is, all of these like Vine stars and the actual president of the Republic of Georgia.
5:02 Speaker 03 Yeah.
5:03 Speaker 01 Even Wyclef Jean gets in on it.
5:05 Speaker 03 What?
5:05 Speaker 01 He composes and performs a song about getting out the vote for Zaza Pachulia.
5:10 Speaker 03 Oh, god.
5:10 Speaker 01 Wow. It's insane.
5:12 Speaker 04 Vote Zaza Pachulia, yeah.
5:19 Speaker 04 For the All-Star Game.
5:24 Speaker 01 And the way All-Star voting worked in 2016 is the top three vote-getters make the team.
5:29 Speaker 03 Okay.
5:29 Speaker 01 And so number one, Kobe Bryant.
5:32 Speaker 03 Good.
5:32 Speaker 01 Obviously. Kevin Durant, right behind him. Number three, Kawhi Leonard. Number four, Zaza Pachulia. He came so close that the next year,
5:47 Speaker 03 Yeah.
5:48 Speaker 01 They changed the rule. So it wasn't fan voting for All-Star starters anymore. It was 50% fan voting, 25% media voting, 25% player vote. And so they changed it because of the Zaza Pachulia Democratic uprising.
6:02 Speaker 03 I did not know that. Because like when we were talking in the pitch meeting itself, we brought up John Scott.
6:07 Speaker 05 There's a surprise leader in fan voting for the upcoming NHL All-Star Game, and his name is, yeah, John Scott, seriously. The Coyotes' tough guy has no goals and only 38 minutes of ice time this season.
6:19 Speaker 03 Hockey player. Yeah, NHL in force, who actually did get into the All-Star Game. Actually proved that he could skate. And did well, but like so many people told that story. And I remember I was sitting there and we were thinking of democratic votes and I was like Oh, oh, I got one. And involves somewhat serious level of democratic corruption. A story that I'm kind of, my past is familiar with.
6:41 Speaker 01 I do want to establish that you are a guy who's done serious journalism about actual democracy.
6:47 Speaker 03 Yeah, we did like stories on the Volney, Brexit, rise of Boko Haram, ISIS.
6:51 Speaker 01 Yeah, just some casual, light reads.
6:54 Speaker 03 It really, it really makes me believe in humanity's capacity for love. This one, though, involved the actual corruption of a democracy.
7:02 Speaker 01 Yes.
7:03 Speaker 03 And there was a hack that happened. And it involved a group of computer scientists who successfully altered a national vote. And it started in the early days of the internet. And I remember pitching to you guys, what do you think about that?
7:20 Speaker 01 I was in, as soon as you said, computer scientists hacking an election.
7:25 Speaker 03 Oh, God, and all of a sudden, it was like that podcast trope of, and the more I started investigating, Pablo, the more I realized that what I thought I knew was actually wrong. And the story itself was so much more wildly corrupt than anything that I could dream, that it actually became a nightmare.
7:41 Speaker 01 That is disturbingly accurate. Your public radio voice is, is actually one that has done those stories.
7:50 Speaker 03 It has done those stories, I feel like, yeah. I feel like it wasn't that much of a reach.
7:55 Speaker 03 But anyway, the whole reason why we're out here is because originally, you know, I was like, we gotta go to this landmark. We even found a journalist who told this story, who'd been working on it for years. A story that involves what used to be, what, the largest democracy in American pop culture?
8:12 Speaker 01 Bigger than sports.
8:13 Speaker 03 I want to make this very clear.
8:14 Speaker 01 We've gone beyond sports.
8:16 Speaker 03 Beyond sports.
8:17 Speaker 01 Into where?
8:18 Speaker 03 Uh, the institution known as Total Request Live.
8:27 Speaker 03 The show is Total Request Live. The channel is MTV.
8:47 Speaker 01 This message is brought to you by Apple Card. With Apple Card, you earn unlimited daily cash back on everyday purchases like groceries, or merch, or tickets to the game. Plus, it can be used anywhere MasterCard is accepted. No matter your team, no matter where you shop, Apple Card is here to help you tackle game day. Apply in the Wallet app on your iPhone today. Subject to credit approval. Apple Card is issued by Goldman Sachs Bank, USA, Salt Lake City Branch. Terms and more at applecard.com.
9:20 Speaker 06 Hi, I'm Jenna Oshkowitz. You might know me from Glee. This is At the Table, the food allergy podcast, a show about food, connection, and what it really looks like to live with food allergies. Each episode, we hear stories from real people like Daniel.
9:35 Speaker 02 People would always think I was lactose intolerant, so I just kind of shortened my explanation to I'm deathly allergic. In a big way that defined a lot of my childhood.
9:46 Speaker 06 And while there are challenges, there are moments that remind you you're not alone. One of the best guys that I dated, he made a point to memorize all my food allergies. So join us and hear their stories and more, because living with food allergies isn't just about what you can't eat, it's about still having your seat at the table. Brought to you by Genentech and Novartis. Listen to At the Table, the food allergy podcast, on America's number one podcast network, iHeart. Follow At the Table and start listening on the free iHeartRadio app today.
10:17 Speaker 00 At Humana, our Medicare Advantage plans are easy to understand and easy on your wallet, like offering more benefits than you'd get from original Medicare alone, and including dental, vision, and hearing coverage in every plan. And the best part is, every plan has a $0 or low monthly plan premium, which makes it easier to save, too. So this Medicare planning season, plan well with Humana. Learn more at gethumana.com. Humana is a Medicare Advantage, HMO, and PPO organization with a Medicare contract. Enrollment in any Humana plan depends on contract renewal.
10:54 Speaker 01 So Yorgo, I am so glad you're here. Glad to be here. I need to make this about me for a second. Okay, fair enough. Because your odyssey, your personal odyssey into this story, which I'm so excited about, reminded me of the way that my life intersects with it.
11:14 Speaker 01 So this is Yorgo Architas. He is a journalist, a filmmaker, a stand-up comic. He's the guy that Bradley connected me with after he met Yorgo deep inside the very same electoral rabbit hole while on assignment from me. Yorgo had spent years of his life, it turns out, reporting a passion project, a forthcoming documentary out this fall, entitled Troll: New Kids on the Block, Total Request Live, and the Chain Letter That Changed the Internet. And when I watched this doc, I got a sneak peek, I realized that not only does it capture my sensory memory of the late 90s in a way that is just perfect,
11:55 Speaker 01 it also is necessary for our investigation here. Because Yorgo happens to be the key to telling you the untold story of what the [bleep] actually happened on a momentous day in American pop culture exactly 25 years ago this week. But what I first needed to do was just tell Yorgo all about how I was born and raised right here in New York City, where this entire thing takes place. And I distinctly remember one day when my older sister, Tracy, who is four years older than me, Okay. did something that had never happened in our family, which is she skipped school Ooh, okay.
12:39 Speaker 01 to go to Times Square Yeah. to go watch a show. Called Total Request Live.
12:47 Speaker 03 I cannot tell you how many people are outside. NSYNC fans, I mean, it's absolutely insane. NSYNC TV is about to get underway. Please welcome in, they're performing the number one video on Total Request Live. It's NSYNC doing "Tearing Up My Heart." Guys?
13:04 Speaker 01 So my ears are actually hurting from the shrieks. That was, you could break glass. Actually painful in terms of just the sound of hundreds, thousands of girls screaming for NSYNC. And they were there to be celebrated on MTV in front of, in front of New York City and America. They're really popping at that point.
13:32 Speaker 01 So the things that I am already like staggered by, rewatching this with you in 2024. Like how perfectly late 90s everything about this is. Oh, the fashion, looks like an Old Navy commercial. Look at it. Tracy Chazelle, who's singing right now, is wearing an orange button down with a sweater vest over it. It's the silliest thing you can imagine. And then you got Chris Kirkpatrick. Oh my God, wearing overalls and goggles and has blonde dreads somehow. Look at Justin Timberlake with the wet ramen hair. Yes. Look at that. The blonde curls just like pile the top. I mean, they're crushing it though. This is a terrific debut. Everybody is eating out of the palm of their hand.
14:14 Speaker 01 And they're the center of the world on MTV. And my sister is in this studio. And I know this, there she is on the left, kind of looks like me. Right there? Yep, in the gray. All the way back there? Yes. No way, how about that? That is Tracy Torre skipping school, total delinquent to worship at the altar of peak boy band. Right there.
14:43 Speaker 02 Sister Tori.
14:44 Speaker 01 I mean.
14:44 Speaker 02 Making, making television.
14:45 Speaker 01 So that was September nineteen ninety-eight. That was the first month of this show's existence.
14:51 Speaker 02 Yes.
14:51 Speaker 01 N'Sync was king and the show itself became like the thing astride like music and pop culture.
14:59 Speaker 02 TRL was a countdown show, daily countdown show. They do top ten videos and the whole idea was born out of, hey, we need to have some kind of programming for children.
15:10 Speaker 01 And so it's a top ten list, which is like not a new foreign concept. But how are they doing it differently?
15:18 Speaker 02 They were making sure that it was voted on by the audience and that it was going to be a daily meritocracy of popularity.
15:28 Speaker 01 Yes.
15:29 Speaker 02 And every single day.
15:30 Speaker 01 Democratic process.
15:31 Speaker 02 Yes.
15:32 Speaker 01 And in this democracy, uh, who is getting elected?
15:36 Speaker 02 Primarily boy bands and pop bands.
15:39 Speaker 01 Their fame got to be the point where not only were these teenage girls like, and, and young people across America, um, very familiar with them as, as these icons, but the people hosting the show. The VJ, I mean, you're go, explain the VJ for people.
15:55 Speaker 02 So the VJ is a video jockey. I remember when I was in elementary school, everybody either wanted to be a veterinarian or they wanted to be a VJ when they grew up.
16:03 Speaker 01 Yes.
16:03 Speaker 02 And, uh, a lot of these VJs got massively, massively popular. Number one was obviously Carson Daly.
16:09 Speaker 01 Mm-hmm.
16:09 Speaker 02 He, uh, got plucked from a radio station and just rose to this astronomical fame.
16:14 Speaker 01 He was the guy introducing N'Sync in the top of the video we just played.
16:17 Speaker 02 Yes, it's wild to me that nobody would know Carson Daly, but I guess I'm very old. But he's on, he's on, uh, the Today Show now.
16:22 Speaker 01 That's right.
16:23 Speaker 02 But then there was other VJs, like there was like, uh, I spoke to Dave Holmes. He got very, very, uh, popular, uh, from that. When it's a teen pop band, when specifically when it's a boy band, uh, the teen, specifically girls, go crazy and suddenly it just had this snowball effect. Every day at three o'clock, like traffic in Times Square shut down so that, uh, thirteen-year-old girls could skip school and come directly into Times Square and yell at a window.
16:55 Speaker 01 This was an economy.
16:57 Speaker 02 Oh, yeah.
16:58 Speaker 01 Like, the business of this, the effect it had on music itself was real.
17:01 Speaker 02 And syncs, no strings attached, comes out. It definitely had the biggest one-week sales of all time. And I think it might have eclipsed 2 million in a week, which is a bananas amount of units to be pushing. They're obviously on MTV every day as the number one or number two video occasionally.
17:17 Speaker 01 It's basically N'Sync TV also is MTV at this point.
17:20 Speaker 02 They had to make a rule where you'd retire a video after 65 days. The "I Drive Myself Crazy" music video, where they're just in an insane asylum because a woman was too hot.
17:35 Speaker 02 All five of them.
17:35 Speaker 01 A tale as old as time.
17:36 Speaker 02 Yeah, a tale as old as time.
17:38 Speaker 01 And so TRL was very, very important, instrumental in the promotion, in the showing.
17:45 Speaker 02 Yeah.
17:45 Speaker 01 To the whole country, here is what's cool now.
17:49 Speaker 02 Yes, and it was Christina Aguilera, Britney Spears, 98 Degrees, Backstreet Boys, and both Backstreet Boys and N'Sync, there was kind of a rivalry, both from Florida, and they both would just shut down Times Square.
18:03 Speaker 01 And the funny part is that, like, the boy band supremacy of 98, 99, it resulted, I remember, like, in, like, running jokes about how no one can possibly unseat them, to the point where, like, the number three slot on the show was like a running joke.
18:18 Speaker 02 Yes, the number three spot was the corn spot.
18:20 Speaker 01 With a K.
18:25 Speaker 02 "Freak on a Leash"
18:26 Speaker 01 Yes.
18:26 Speaker 02 is a terrific song, and it holds up, and a terrific music video. Like, this is what's so crazy, is like, the N'Sync videos were good, Backstreet videos were fine, but then you have, like, "Freak on a Leash", where there's a bullet going through everything, like, it's animated and it's live action, and couldn't beat "Baby One More Time" or, uh, whatever.
18:44 Speaker 01 Never.
18:45 Speaker 02 Could never just do it, could never beat "God Must've Spent A Little More Time On You",
18:48 Speaker 01 Yeah.
18:48 Speaker 02 Just...
18:48 Speaker 01 Always number three with a bullet.
18:50 Speaker 02 Always number three with a bullet, yeah.
18:53 Speaker 01 Eminem was a major player in this era.
18:56 Speaker 02 He's big because of TRL. He was a person, I mean frankly, who was palatable as a hip hop artist to make it onto a mainstream show at that point.
19:06 Speaker 01 Limp Bizkit also, of course, on the countdown.
19:09 Speaker 02 Very big. Kid Rock, there was like, there was like the alternative people for kids who had divorced parents who were like, okay, we need some real stuff. And there were the people who lived in the suburbs who were like, my crush doesn't like me. I need to listen to N'Sync or whatever.
19:23 Speaker 01 Van Puff Daddy, just showing up like running on a treadmill.
19:27 Speaker 02 Probably imagining allegations or chasing him. I think he was P. Diddy at that point.
19:33 Speaker 01 And then it was, of course, like Beyonce and Destiny's Child era.
19:36 Speaker 02 Yes.
19:36 Speaker 01 Tom Cruise would show up because everybody showed up to go speak directly to the youth of America.
19:42 Speaker 02 It got to the point where TRL was so popular that they could be like, hey, Tom, Tuesday doesn't really work. Can we, can we move you to Wednesday? Like, that's how much leverage they had.
19:50 Speaker 01 Right. So this place, this studio, which was glass windows up above Times Square, like the second floor or so, you could see in front of you just like this teeming mass of humanity who would just show up to be a part of the show.
20:03 Speaker 02 Also, because it's pre-social media and cameras, being on television meant a lot, even for just two seconds. Like, it was cool to be on TV. I know you've been on television for a decade, you don't care, but a lot of people actually do care about just having a one moment and screaming, "Hi, Mom!" at the camera. That doesn't exist anymore. Nobody screams, "Hi, Mom!"
20:22 Speaker 06 Hi, my name is Michelle Marks and I came all the way from Gaithersburg, Maryland to request porn, "Freak on a Leash" because they're my favorite band and I love when the bullet goes into the poster. Woo!
20:33 Speaker 01 The stakes of this show are now obvious, right? This is an economic juggernaut that was capturing a genuine cultural zeitgeist when it came to young people mattering financially, in terms of cultural influence, in terms of all of this stuff. What that meant was that these elections, the Democratic election of who was going to be the number one video, the number two video, all of that stuff really mattered.
20:59 Speaker 02 I spoke to TRL co-creator Adam Freeman about this, is that they played off It mattering to children and the fact that children and teenagers have no control in their life over anything. They have to find out when they go to school, everything's very regimented and all their decisions are made for them. But when it comes to fandom and who gets to be on this television show, they got the opportunity to program it. And that was very intoxicating for them. Well, T R L, we were all about connecting the kids with their idols. This was pre Twitter, pre Instagram. You know, you couldn't just log on to Twitter and see what Britney Spears was wearing that morning. If you wanted to know something about your favorite artist or you wanted to make a connection with them,
21:43 Speaker 02 you needed a place like T R L to give you access.
21:47 Speaker 01 So in terms of the high school cafeteria that is American music at this point, embodied by T R L.
21:52 Speaker 02 Hundred percent.
21:53 Speaker 01 Yeah, Ben Sync is, you know, prom king. Who's now like uncool? Who do you not want to be associated with?
21:59 Speaker 02 As of this point, I would say in 1999,
22:04 Speaker 02 boy bands that were not cool would be boy bands who are now like teenage to like young adult man bands. And it's very uncomfortable to like watch them age in that way. And so with that being said, the biggest boy band of the late eighties and early nineties was New Kids on the Block.
22:20 Speaker 01 Yeah.
22:20 Speaker 02 They were what we now think of Nickelback and Imagine Dragons. They were that in 1999.
22:26 Speaker 01 New Kids on the Block by this point, I remember them also from the time my sister was into them.
22:30 Speaker 02 How old was she then?
22:31 Speaker 01 So my sister was born in 81.
22:33 Speaker 02 Okay, yes.
22:34 Speaker 01 The New Kids on the Block, like they were in her locker for a time.
22:43 Speaker 02 They were very, very big and they were all about talking about how tough they were. And that did not seem like something that you'd want to just think is cool 10 years later.
22:53 Speaker 01 Yeah, yeah, yeah. By this point in 98, 99, it was essentially like watching something in black and white. They were the dinosaur that everybody was off of because they were now entranced by the new shiny stuff.
23:04 Speaker 02 They were just the old antiquated version of what we were watching now, and that just seems lame. That's like, it's like MySpace to TikTok now. New Kids on the Block also, they started off very squeaky clean. Please don't go, girl, the right stuff, et cetera. And then as they went on, they started to get more street, you know, and they would do the overalls with one thing undone. And, you know, interesting facial hair and tattoos and things of that nature. So they got, they got a little, they got a little tougher as they went on.
23:37 Speaker 01 And so the first boy band commits the cardinal sin of aging. They betray the very premise of their brand. They are now old and uncool.
23:46 Speaker 02 Yes.
23:46 Speaker 01 And this is all to say that they weren't on TRL.
23:51 Speaker 02 No, which made them the perfect band to do what ended up happening. And I spent quite a bit of my life trying to get to the bottom of this silly story.
24:02 Speaker 02 I would call it a catalytic moment in trolling history.
24:08 Speaker 02 A chain letter starts going around.
24:10 Speaker 01 I think we gotta explain what a chain letter is.
24:12 Speaker 02 A chain letter is a thing where people would write out just these screeds and just forward them. And then they would, most of the time, threaten that all your family would die if you didn't forward it. And so in your subject line, it would go forward, forward, forward, forward, forward, forward, forward, forward. And then a whole, all caps, like you're reading Kanye West tweets. Please don't delete this yet.
24:33 Speaker 01 This is a disturbingly accurate summary of what would occasionally populate my America Online inbox.
24:39 Speaker 02 Oh, yeah. And finally, American Online started putting it into spam, but it was like...
24:43 Speaker 01 But it was like, essentially, threats. If you don't forward this along to however many other people, bad things will happen to you.
24:51 Speaker 02 It was like making people retweet with a knife to their throat, a superstitious knife to their throat.
24:56 Speaker 01 Correct.
24:58 Speaker 02 I actually had Dave Holmes read the letter for us.
25:02 Speaker 02 Hello, all. This is a chain letter that I am starting. Hear me out. There's nothing I loathe more than chain letters. Well, except for the teenage obsession and recent success of such male quintuplet vocal acts as the Backstreet Boys' "In Sync 98 Degrees and Five." The idea struck me like a truck while I was watching TRL yesterday. TRL, for those of you who don't know, is the abbreviation for the showcase of Carson Daly's witticisms that is Total Request Live on MTV. MTV itself being an abbreviation for music television. He's done his research. Uh, here's what we all must pull together and do. Send this email to as many people as possible. The message is simple.
25:43 Speaker 02 On March 10th, 1999, everyone who has received this email will get online and before the airing of Total Request Live, cast their vote for the New Kids on the Block epic music video, "Hangin' Tough." You in turn will not reap, that's misspelled, lifelong rewards and benefits if you do, but you will laugh your ass off if it works. It is the ultimate insult to popular culture. We can make this happen. It's just a pure goofy troll, just like, yeah, let's just thumb the nose at the people in power.
26:14 Speaker 01 And so the thing that they want to infiltrate the democratic machine that is TRL with, the thing that is in control of music and culture in 99, is specifically this music video for this song, "Hangin' Tough."
26:34 Speaker 02 It's not my favorite NKOTV song. "Hangin' Tough" is kind of like the perfect encapsulation of like a time that I'm not familiar with.
26:41 Speaker 01 Yes, the late 80s.
26:43 Speaker 02 Yes.
26:43 Speaker 01 This is what I think of when I think of 88, 89, 10 years earlier.
26:52 Speaker 01 Just big McGruff the Crime Dog energy.
26:55 Speaker 02 100%. Seeming like, and this would be a thing that became very popular in the 90s, was it seemed like they might have been posers.
27:02 Speaker 01 Hmm.
27:03 Speaker 02 You just barely got chin hair and, you know, your voice is cracking because you're going through puberty. What the hell do you know about punching somebody with brass knuckles? We have, we have lines shaved in our, in our hair. We have rat tails. We have, we have distressed denim. We have, uh, early Hot Topic t-shirts. We have fedoras. We have, we have, we have dangling jewelry.
27:32 Speaker 01 And so this chain letter, in so many words, is taking off.
27:35 Speaker 02 Yes. It started, I think, in like, in January-ish? To get to like the first ever thing is impossible because they're through with emails.
27:42 Speaker 01 Who wrote the initial email?
27:44 Speaker 02 Well, it is signed by a guy named James Vaughn and it is impossible to find that man because there is no saying whether or not it's a pseudonym or not.
27:55 Speaker 01 God, this is some V for vendetta shit. The voting mechanism, though, of how you participate in the democracy of MTV and TRL. My sister would call up the hotline and vote for the options presented, vote for NSYNC all the time.
28:10 Speaker 02 You could vote by phone, which they had a third party that could, that would collect all the data for him and fax it over.
28:16 Speaker 01 But there are other mechanisms of democracy.
28:18 Speaker 02 Yes, you could also do it online if you went to MTV.com and just, there was a whole bunch of options and then there was other and you could type, type in what you wanted to see and that's what they did.
28:29 Speaker 01 And so this is where our producer Bradley Campbell brought me an angle on the story, which was about how there were these computer science, like this is how big the chain letter movement got, apparently.
28:39 Speaker 02 Yes.
28:39 Speaker 01 That there are these computer scientists at a university that we cannot legally name, apparently. But they basically engineered this algorithm, this program that hacked the vote by repeatedly voting for other and New Kids on the Block, Hangin' Tough on the website over and over and over and over and over again, to the point where like this was now something of a movement and a movement to take over Total Request Live.
29:07 Speaker 02 It was also public that you could see on the website how much the percentage was going and it was starting to get to the like the high 60s for other.
29:14 Speaker 01 So there is documentation across the internet now that this is a thing, that there's a movement forming, there are, there are people who are cheering on the revolution. And when do the people who run Total Request Live and MTV realize this? When did they begin to take this seriously?
29:30 Speaker 02 A younger person on staff goes up to the bigger head honchos and goes, listen, on the message boards, they're saying that there's no way they'll ever play it and to frankly, stop sharing the chain letter because it's a waste of our time. But on the polls, it's very, very high. So we need to do something about that. And then after this conversation, they start really hunkering down and figuring out what they're gonna do. We gave the kids the power. So if we somehow gave them the impression that they didn't have any power, um, what are we standing on?
30:13 Speaker 00 At Humana, our Medicare Advantage plans are easy to understand and easy on your wallet. Like offering more benefits than you'd get from original Medicare alone. And including dental, vision, and hearing coverage in every plan. And the best part is, every plan has a $0 or low monthly plan premium, which makes it easier to save, too. So this Medicare planning season, plan well with Humana. Learn more at gethumana.com. Humana is a Medicare Advantage HMO and PPO organization with a Medicare contract. Enrollment in any Humana plan depends on contract renewal.
30:51 Speaker 01 So Yergo, this brings us to the fateful day in question. This is 25 years ago. This week, it is March 1999. What a time to be alive. And who was hosting TRL that day?
31:06 Speaker 02 Dave Holmes was hosting TRL that day. My number one goal was just to not burn it all down when the regular host was out of town. But also make sure that before and after every commercial, tease that something special's coming. Today's show, folks, brace yourselves. If there's a railing, or a wall, or a post of some kind for you to hold on to, I urge you to do so. We have your top 10 requests, as always. Two big debuts in the top 10 today, one of which is absolutely going to throw your mind. It's freaking us out over here.
31:35 Speaker 01 And they teased this over and over and over again.
31:39 Speaker 02 A debut video that's going to blow you away. And we're going to send one lucky NSYNC fan to their show at Nassau College Stadium. It's all coming, but TRL continues, so move. Oh yeah, that's how I know, is because I just sat there, nine years old, just so excited. Oh, I had it could be anything. And we haven't even gotten to our big debut of the day. Once you see that, you'll understand what I'm talking about. All right, welcome back.
32:00 Speaker 01 It's also, like, this episode, rewatching it, is, it just bathed me with a warm glow of late 90s nostalgia.
32:10 Speaker 02 100%, the turn of the century aesthetic. That we, we love so much. But right now, let's get into the request. You ready to get into the request, folks? I sure am. Let's start at number 10, shall we? Returning to the countdown at number 10 today. It's Sugar Ray with Every Morning. Now, these guys are touring with Everlast right now. They're bringing down the house everywhere they play. They hit Seattle tomorrow night. And making a dive on today's show, down two spots to number nine. It's the offspring with Why Don't You Get a Job. Quite a contrast. They debuted on Tuesday's show at number five, came in like gangbusters. Now they're already down to number nine. What gives, folks?
32:44 Speaker 01 And then number eight.
32:45 Speaker 02 Yes.
32:46 Speaker 01 Fat Boy Slim.
32:47 Speaker 02 Fat Boy Slim, praise you.
32:54 Speaker 02 Terrific music video.
32:55 Speaker 01 Oh, just like VHS camcorder, almost like found footage, handheld style.
32:59 Speaker 02 Of them doing kind of a flash mob, an early flash mob in a mall.
33:03 Speaker 01 Number seven.
33:04 Speaker 02 Yes.
33:05 Speaker 01 Eminem.
33:06 Speaker 02 Hi, my name is.
33:10 Speaker 02 Hi, my name is.
33:12 Speaker 01 Huh?
33:14 Speaker 01 Yep.
33:15 Speaker 02 Just, just gleefully white trash.
33:17 Speaker 01 They've switched over to number six.
33:19 Speaker 02 Number six.
33:20 Speaker 01 Orgy.
33:21 Speaker 02 Orgy, Blue Monday.
33:28 Speaker 01 Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.
33:30 Speaker 02 I loved that song. Stop making orgy sounds. No, I used to love it and it was so awkward to go up to my mom and be like, I love orgy. I really want an orgy CD.
33:42 Speaker 01 Well, it was a great juxtaposition with number five.
33:44 Speaker 02 Yes.
33:45 Speaker 01 One of the most iconic songs, I would say, in American history.
33:53 Speaker 01 I mean, I went through puberty, not just simultaneous to this song. I would argue because of this song.
34:02 Speaker 02 It's weird now to say this, but first crush ever.
34:04 Speaker 01 It's actually mesmerizing as an artifact.
34:07 Speaker 02 It's the schoolgirl outfit, which was the biggest thing.
34:10 Speaker 01 Those lockers, that hallway. At one point, she's holding a basketball.
34:15 Speaker 02 And it's just not, it's simply not hyperbolic to say that it is one of the biggest. And most influential songs of American history.
34:23 Speaker 01 Yes, fully agree. And so TRL that day goes from that into.
34:29 Speaker 02 All right, let's get back into the countdown, shall we? Let's check in with 98 Degrees. They drop a spot to number four today. Here they are with the hardest thing.
34:41 Speaker 02 The hardest thing, I think it's a boxing music video where Nick Lachey wanted to get jacked.
34:45 Speaker 01 It's very dissonant because the visuals are boxing.
34:49 Speaker 02 Yes.
34:50 Speaker 01 And the music is something that a boxer would never want to hear before a fight. And then number three, in their slot.
34:59 Speaker 02 In their slot. Back to number three today. Here is Korn with Freak on a Leash. Banger of a video. There's still movie magic in it. You still don't know how they do the bullet stuff?
35:08 Speaker 01 Nope, still don't know.
35:10 Speaker 02 Unfortunately, they were stuck in their spot again.
35:12 Speaker 01 Yes, as is their cosmic fate.
35:14 Speaker 02 Plus, we have a new number one and a TRL top ten debut that had our statisticians kind of scratching their heads. And he actually scratches his head because he
35:23 Speaker 01 Is a pro.
35:24 Speaker 02 Yeah, I mean, he really is a pro. He's terrific. And I'm still just dying to find this out. Cause it's like, I'm like, I'm in third grade and I am.
35:32 Speaker 01 Are they gonna do it?
35:33 Speaker 02 Are they gonna, what's gonna happen?
35:35 Speaker 01 Where's the reveal?
35:36 Speaker 02 It could be anything.
35:38 Speaker 01 And so we get in the commercial break that he throws to a Jennifer Love Hewitt, Neutrogena commercial.
35:47 Speaker 01 And when they come back from commercial.
35:49 Speaker 02 Let's check out the totals for your number two request. I'm telling you, this is gonna rock your world. Now I got 38% of your emails. That's the highest number ever, highest percentage ever for emails. 26% of your phone votes. Now, yesterday we got a few calls for this video. We had some people outside holding signs. We're not sure what happened. It looks like you people just mobilized and, and put somebody on the countdown today that has never been on the countdown before. New Kids on the Block. I'm, I'm gonna say it again. New Kids on the Block. The, hey, you know, you ask, we give.
36:17 Speaker 01 Just a kind of irate groan.
36:20 Speaker 02 Yeah.
36:20 Speaker 01 Rumbling through America's democracy.
36:23 Speaker 02 It's just being upset at a surprise. Cause you can hear in the video, people go, oh, and then they like start reacting. They go, oh, oh, no.
36:35 Speaker 01 People who were aware of the NKOTB movement. I mean, it was unclear until the very moment they put them at number two ahead of Korn, that they were actually going to show this thing that in reality, most of America didn't want.
36:49 Speaker 02 Yes, but there was just a very small contingent that grew to be a bigger contingent on the internet that we just wanted it so bad, just to say they did it, just for the goof.
36:59 Speaker 01 So I should point out that them getting number two on the strength, as Dave Holmes cited, of 26% phone votes is impressive.
37:09 Speaker 02 It would 100% be very impressive if it was true.
37:15 Speaker 01 So explain the truth of this fateful day in music history.
37:22 Speaker 02 So I spoke to one of the handful of people who actually counted the votes, and they straight up said that that number could not exist because it's impossible that New Kids on the Block would be an option on the phone voting.
37:34 Speaker 01 Wait, so describe how it is that phone voting works. So you had all these options, NSYNC is like, you know, dial one if you want to vote for NSYNC.
37:44 Speaker 02 Yes.
37:45 Speaker 01 And New Kids was...
37:46 Speaker 02 Not an option, at all. There, it's impossible that they would have been.
37:52 Speaker 01 They didn't put New Kids on the phone voting like ballot?
37:56 Speaker 02 They, no, of course not. There's just a whole troll. It was just birthed from a galvanizing campaign on the internet. And honestly, they closed the online voting portion or the polls 12 hours before the show came on.
38:10 Speaker 01 Why are they presenting fake numbers? What are they, what is MTV and TRL, what are they doing here?
38:16 Speaker 02 It's the kind of stuff that I'm sure executives would proudly brag about at cocktail parties.
38:23 Speaker 01 So this is where I do need to jump in and take a breath and just point out that these executives at these hypothetical cocktail parties got away with something. Right? This whole fake 26% ...phone vote thing, these fake statistics that they'd put on a graphic on that episode of TRL that they had had Dave Holmes read aloud, all of it was sloppy, clearly. And clearly a clue. Because I need you to remember what the co-creator of TRL had told us earlier. He had said, he had told you, Orgo, that the reason these executives all started freaking
39:06 Speaker 01 out about the New Kids stuff was not because of the votes. It was about perception. We gave the kids the power, so if we somehow gave them the impression that they didn't have any power, um, what are we standing on? They were not concerned about the votes flooding their system conspicuously, thanks to Chain Letters and Bradley's computer scientist hackers. They were freaking out after people started talking very publicly on message boards over and over and over again about how they were concerned that MTV probably wasn't even gonna count their votes. And so it's finally time to find out the answer to that question, that last part, about what
39:51 Speaker 01 TRL was actually standing on this entire time, beyond just the New Kids saga. Because, again, these TRL executives were not freaking out because their electoral integrity was being compromised by an organized army of trolls. No, they were freaking out because people were questioning their system. They were freaking out because of a secret. A secret they would successfully protect and deny despite a sloppy fake vote percentage and made-up statistics for 25 years. And they would have gotten away with it.
40:33 Speaker 02 But I talked to somebody who was on the daily beat of counting the votes and accumulating the list, and his name was Kevin Hershey, and he kind of laid it out for me.
40:45 Speaker 01 We definitely had to rewrite the rules for a request show because if we were... You've got to remember, this was such a behemoth and such a money generator, and it was... If you allowed the other sort of category for true fans to just want their death metal band to show up on TRL, that wasn't a part of what the show was meant to be. So we had
41:26 Speaker 01 to very democratically decide as a group that we did want to program this show a certain way. So that said, only certain genres perhaps were a part of the voting process. That is a seismic revelation to me.
41:49 Speaker 02 Yeah, it's pretty wild that he said that, and he's being very careful with how he's describing it.
41:55 Speaker 01 He used the word democratic to discuss the discussion in the room of the executives who are deciding what to put on TRL, which is a funny choice of word because the definition of a closed-door meeting deciding the outcome of an election is anti-democratic.
42:10 Speaker 02 Yes.
42:11 Speaker 01 In the big-picture sense.
42:12 Speaker 02 100%.
42:13 Speaker 01 They knew what they were doing the whole time.
42:15 Speaker 02 Of cour... yeah, they 100% knew what they were doing, and they were being very selective and kind of tipping the scales in any way they needed to, insofar as the democracy was...
42:27 Speaker 01 Not a democracy.
42:28 Speaker 02 No, no, not at all.
42:30 Speaker 01 No, I mean, look, so just to connect all the dots here, the reason why the show had this decision to make, as we discussed, when they were informed of the democratic movement, the grassroots effort to put New Kids on the Block onto TRL in some sort of high-ranking spot, the reason they were so worried was not because they were going to put uncool music onto their cool show.
42:53 Speaker 02 Yes.
42:53 Speaker 01 Because they had so many votes, they were worried because the foremost laboratory of pop cultural democracy in America was not actually a democracy at all.
43:07 Speaker 02 There's no infrastructure to really, really count every single vote. Like, it's just, it's just a cloudy mess.
43:13 Speaker 01 So I wanted to say that I appreciate Kevin Hershey coming clean on this.
43:19 Speaker 02 Oh, yeah. I couldn't believe it. Like, we went over there, he was a sweetie, me and my terrific director of photography, Ben Brady, we went over there and hung out with him. He's like, "I'm just gonna serve you secrets, bro. Just sit down and we're doing it."
43:32 Speaker 01 Yes. So his title was Director of Music and Talent at MTV.
43:35 Speaker 02 Yes.
43:36 Speaker 01 The entire time, engineering what America's tastes were, under the guise of just reflecting the will of the people. They were, in a sense, the shadow government of pop culture.
43:52 Speaker 02 And it gets even crazier in that they had certain data where they could go and look and be like, "Oh, you know, Texas in the South doesn't really like TRL that much. So we should get Jessica Simpson, who is from the South, and put her on the style pad. Maybe put her even higher up, maybe one or two, so you don't have to listen to the whole thing. And then we're gonna kind of culturally gerrymander to make sure that this person becomes a hit."
44:14 Speaker 01 The reason why other music videos, then, were falling in the countdown was not because of the meritocracy of votes, it was because there were decisions made that, in this case, seemed to be finally and suddenly impacted by the fact that the conversation around New Kids on the Block being this movement were publicly documented.
44:38 Speaker 02 Yeah. It's like, it's quite an embarrassment if you just see everybody be like, "Oh, you guys are full of [BLEEP], and then you end up being full of [BLEEP]."
44:46 Speaker 01 You need to put them into the countdown.
44:48 Speaker 02 You have to, by all means necessary, figure out a way to get there, or else you're gonna lose this idea of credibility that you have, and then you get the whole ruse is up.
44:57 Speaker 01 Right.
44:58 Speaker 02 The whole thing's done.
44:58 Speaker 01 In my mind, it's like, look, we never actually plugged in these voting machines, but now all of these people are lining up at them, and they're all leaving with the exit polls indicating they're all voting for New Kids on the Block hanging tough. So if we don't put the most obvious exit poll result into our countdown, people are gonna wonder, "What about the voting machines?"
45:21 Speaker 02 Their decision-making process was the most fascinating part of this whole thing to me.
45:25 Speaker 01 Yes.
45:26 Speaker 02 Why they decided to put it at number two. The reason why they put it at number two, which is probably why they teased it so much, is because they wanted those people to watch as much, the people that were trolling, watch as much as humanly possible, all the way, all the show, and get all of those minute-by-minute ratings that are so crucial. And so, they got it and they decided to put them at number two. So then, they kinda win, but they don't let the trolls fully win. And then, immediately after this, and they get all the ratings for it.
45:55 Speaker 01 Right.
45:56 Speaker 02 Which is just a brilliant plan for an executive.
45:58 Speaker 01 Well, I mean, also because, I mean, of course, like, number one is going to be...
46:03 Speaker 02 N'Sync, God must've spent a little more time on you.
46:05 Speaker 01 Yes.
46:05 Speaker 02 Yes.
46:06 Speaker 01 Always.
46:13 Speaker 01 And it sounds like what they wanted to do was manage this thing such that the people who were trolling them got some element of satisfaction, but not the full satisfaction that would have resulted in follow-up reporting.
46:25 Speaker 02 Which is what happened on the message boards afterwards, where they were like, "Oh, okay, at least we know that TRL isn't totally rigged."
46:30 Speaker 01 Right.
46:30 Speaker 02 Yes.
46:31 Speaker 01 What they did not count on was that, um, 25 years later, one of those kids watching TRL...
46:39 Speaker 02 Would be like, "What the hell's going on here? Why the hell did that happen?"
46:57 Speaker 01 How did New Kids on the Block themselves feel about being the subject of this troll job and now quietly this epic judo move on the part of music television executives?
47:10 Speaker 02 Because of how big TRL was, Columbia actually called one of the executives and said, "Thank you very much for doing that." Record sales skyrocketed. Uh, I don't know if Bradley told you about this, but Bradley told me that he had a friend who worked at Sam Goody, and for a week in 1999, the guy was like, "I don't know what the hell's happening, but New Kids on the Block is flying off the shelf. We can't keep this greatest hits on there. I don't know what's going on." So that's how it happened in the moment. But I spoke to one of the New Kids on the Block, Joey McIntyre, and got his perspective on it. I don't, you know, remember it vividly, but I do remember it happening.
47:45 Speaker 04 Just sweet little Valentine from the Blockheads.
47:50 Speaker 02 But he wasn't completely aware that it was a troll.
47:54 Speaker 01 That was my question, was how much did he know about all of the reporting that you've now revealed for the first time?
48:00 Speaker 02 I revealed it to him in person.
48:03 Speaker 04 Maybe I'm not young enough to know exactly what a troll is, but I mean, adoration and fellowship and passion for something you love is, it's sort of a black and white thing, you know, how you package it or whatever it is, it doesn't matter. I mean, you have to recognize it at a certain point. And I think, you know, that's what happened.
48:29 Speaker 02 They might have been trolling, and maybe I don't understand what a troll is, but it's good to know that people still give a [BLEEP].
48:34 Speaker 01 Right, right.
48:34 Speaker 02 And this obviously was probably just a blip for the New Kids on the Block's career. They ended up selling out arenas and still do really, really well. But what it meant for the internet is a different kind of thing, because it's really the first example of the internet coming together to troll just for a goof, and the institution being like, "All right, we'll do it. We have to do it. We're backed into a corner." And this leads you to, you know, Pitbull a couple of years ago had to go to Walmart.
49:02 Speaker 01 Oh, in Alaska.
49:03 Speaker 02 In Alaska because of an online vote.
49:05 Speaker 04 There's a huge Walmart slash Sheetz energy strip campaign going on, and I heard that Kodiak, Alaska has the most likes.
49:15 Speaker 02 And he actually did it because he's Mr. Worldwide. And you have examples like that.
49:19 Speaker 01 Oh, the Bodie McBoatface thing.
49:21 Speaker 02 Bodie McBoatface thing. The Natural Environment Research Council asked the public to help name the UK's newest $300 million research ship. Leading in the vote so far, Bodie McBoatface. Where does that come from? There's so many different examples of this happening, and it all just started with this crazy chain letter on Total Request Live, emboldening groups to know that it's possible.
49:46 Speaker 01 Right, which is all to say that even if the thing they were subverting and taking hold of for one day was not itself truly democratic, the movement that forced their hand was populist.
49:59 Speaker 02 Yes.
50:00 Speaker 01 Having now learned the truth behind...
50:05 Speaker 01 This fateful day 25 years ago and what really happened? What are you left feeling?
50:10 Speaker 02 All of the people who got mad about MTV and had conspiracies about like their, like all the record labels are in their pockets.
50:17 Speaker 01 Corn cannot possibly always be number three.
50:20 Speaker 02 They were actually right.
50:22 Speaker 02 And it's very funny, and I think now-
50:25 Speaker 01 Yes, we are the freaks on a leash.
50:26 Speaker 02 Yes.
50:27 Speaker 01 A leash held by corporate television overlords.
50:32 Speaker 02 And now I look at a whole bunch of different situations when it comes to showbiz and just kind of wonder what's going on behind the curtain. And I don't throw away kind of any conspiracy when it comes to show business. But the number one thing that I think I took away from it is that it does not cloud my vision of Total Request Live in any way. It is not, like, in no way has it solely anything that I know about TRL, because it's a vibe.
50:56 Speaker 01 Look, their core insight was, this is a show for kids.
51:00 Speaker 02 Yes.
51:00 Speaker 01 Allegedly by kids.
51:02 Speaker 02 Yes.
51:03 Speaker 01 The latter part was not true, but the former part is still so resonant, such that today, 25 years later, I still feel like it. I still feel like a kid watching that show.
51:16 Speaker 02 Yeah, it's totally, it's like, it's perfect and it's so of a time. And it's something that you can't really, it's a really you had to be there kind of thing.
51:24 Speaker 01 TRL goes off the air, it's November 16th, 2008. There's this big grand finale show.
51:31 Speaker 02 Yes.
51:31 Speaker 01 The run ends after 10 years and 2,247 episodes.
51:37 Speaker 02 Yeah.
51:39 Speaker 02 That's pretty impressive.
51:40 Speaker 01 In retrospect, it's weird to do an episode where we expose something and are simultaneously nostalgic-
51:49 Speaker 02 Yeah.
51:50 Speaker 01 -for what I was sold.
51:52 Speaker 02 I don't feel cheated in the least bit, like, at all.
51:56 Speaker 01 What Total Request Live did was recognize and fear and respect, like-
52:07 Speaker 01 The young person as like a thing that mattered, as a thing that was worth strategizing around and investing in.
52:15 Speaker 02 Like, it's really, it felt like it was cool and it was for big kids.
52:18 Speaker 01 Yeah.
52:19 Speaker 02 And the concept of big kids, I've forgotten about, but it was a real thing.
52:24 Speaker 01 Yeah, kids getting to feel like they were at the grownups table.
52:28 Speaker 02 And not only were they at the grownups table, they had to choose what they ate.
52:31 Speaker 01 Yes.
52:31 Speaker 02 That's pretty cool.
52:33 Speaker 01 God, even if it turns out that our parents were in charge the whole time.
52:37 Speaker 02 Yeah, the entire time. They were just making us like, no, you need to have your nutrition.
52:42 Speaker 01 Yeah, you need to have your corn.
52:45 Speaker 02 Oh, [bleep] you Pablo. God damn it.
52:51 Speaker 01 Um, Yorgo, thank you for your reporting. Thank you for, and I mean this sincerely, thank you for bringing closure to, uh, to my puberty.
52:59 Speaker 02 Oh, uh, I think you're still a couple of years away from that.
53:08 Speaker 01 Okay, for more info on Yorgo's doc, which is very, very different from this episode, I will point out, please check out trolldoc.com. It's gonna have its world premiere at the Cinequest Film Festival in Silicon Valley this Sunday. It'll be screened at the Florida Film Festival and the Dallas International Film Festival in April, with a lot more to come. But for now, this has been Pablo Torre Finds Out, a Metalark Media production, and we'll talk to you next time.
53:48 Speaker 00 Network freedom and flexibility, that's what you want in a healthcare plan. With a Humana Medicare Advantage PPO plan, you can see any doctor in the country who accepts Medicare, including specialists. No referrals, no kidding. Learn more at gethumana.com. See any doctor who accepts Medicare and is willing to build Humana. Humana PPOs may not be available in all areas. Benefits and costs share may vary. Humana is a Medicare Advantage PPO organization with a Medicare contract. Enrollment in any Humana plan depends on contract renewal.
Previous Share & Tell & Somethingburgers with Domonique Foxworth and David Samson Next Tom Brady's Real Origin Story: The 25-Year Mystery, Solved (PTFO Vault) Page updated November 3, 2026 · transcript and summary are machine-generated