Episode notes
Isar Aerospace's Spectrum rocket reached orbit from Andøya, Norway, on its second flight. The European Commission calls it the first privately developed rocket to orbit from continental Europe. ESA's Boost program put public money on the vehicle, the German Space Agency selected the payloads, and Isar is still confirming whether the five CubeSats are working. Also: a Wisconsin sheriff's department searched a Navy veteran's plate more than a hundred times in Flock after he complained about a deputy; Chrome's delete-on-close setting still keeps Google site data; and U.S. Wikimedia Foundation staff voted 158 to 14 to join CWA Local 9415 after management declined card-check. The side of tech news nobody talks about.
Hosts: Alex & Jordan
Show: Chief Skeptic Officer — The side of tech news nobody talks about.
Drop: Daily at 7:00 A.M. America/New_York
Episode date: 2026-09-06
In this episode
Orbit first, cargo later — Spectrum reached orbit from Andøya on flight two, 5 Sept 2026. Norway is not in the EU. ESA Boost and DLR selected the cargo. Isar is still confirming satellite status.
The search after the complaint — Napoleon Jones was jailed five hours with no charge, then filed a complaint. His plate was searched more than a hundred times in Flock. The deputy named in the complaint said a lieutenant ordered him to type it. This is a lawsuit, not a verdict.
Delete everyone except Google — Jeff Johnson tested Chrome 152.0.7977.83, not signed in. Delete-on-close wiped other sites. Google.com site data stayed. Google has not admitted a deliberate exception.
Cards first, vote second — U.S. Wikimedia Foundation staff voted 158 to 14 to join CWA Local 9415. Management declined card-check in July. There is no contract yet. The workers' FAQ names AI; the Foundation announcement does not.
Links
AI disclosure
This episode was created with artificial intelligence. Alex & Jordan are AI hosts; their voices and conversation are generated with AI. Research and editorial judgment shape the skeptic angles; we do not invent quotes, scores, or viral claims about the news.
Transcript
Alex and Jordan, turn by turn. Tap a line to jump in the player.
0:00
Alex
A German company's private rocket reached orbit from Norway on its second flight.
0:05
Jordan
A Wisconsin sheriff's department searched a Navy veteran's plate more than a hundred times after he complained about a deputy.
0:13
Alex
A developer found Chrome's delete-on-close setting still keeps Google's site data.
0:19
Jordan
U.S. staff at the Wikimedia Foundation voted to join CWA Local 9415.
0:26
Jordan
That's the board. Stay for the audit. We open those up. Today's Chief Skeptic Officer.
0:42
Jordan
What if there was an AI that researched the tech news, checked the sources, and asked what the tech news is not telling you?
0:50
Alex
That's us. I'm Alex.
0:52
Jordan
And I'm Jordan.
0:53
Alex
You're listening to Chief Skeptic Officer. The side of tech news nobody talks about.
0:59
Jordan
Every day at seven A.M. New York time. Wherever you get your podcasts.
1:03
Alex
Story one. That night launch is Spectrum, Isar Aerospace's private rocket. It lifted off from Andøya in Norway at 10:12 P.M. Central European Summer Time on September fifth.
1:15
Jordan
On flight number two. Flight one lasted about thirty seconds in 2025.
1:20
Alex
This time Spectrum reached orbit. That is a step.
1:25
Jordan
Isar named the mission Onward and Upward. Its launch page labels this one SECOND FLIGHT.
1:32
Jordan
And a narrow first. The European Commission calls it the first privately developed rocket to reach orbit from continental Europe.
1:41
Alex
Right. Norway is not in the European Union. Ariane still flies from Kourou, Europe's usual launch site in South America, not on the continent. This is not Europe's first trip to orbit, or Ariane's funeral.
1:53
Jordan
Hacker News is arguing over that wording now. One side says Europe is breaking its dependence. The other says, "Ariane already exists."
2:02
Alex
Both are reaching past the event. The useful first is a private European company reaching orbit with its own launcher from the continent.
2:12
Jordan
Fine. But "private" starts to wobble when you ask who set the exam.
2:17
Alex
Go on.
2:18
Jordan
ESA's Boost program put public money into the rocket and this flight. The German Space Agency selected the payloads. Isar is also chasing a 2027 launch milestone in an ESA competition.
2:31
Alex
So when Isar says sovereign access, it means private hardware with public money and public cargo.
2:38
Jordan
Wait, that makes it sound fake. It reached orbit. Public support does not cancel the engineering.
2:46
Alex
Fair. I was flattening it.
2:48
Jordan
The achievement is real. The independence claim is early. Europe is helping build another launch option because Europe wants another launch option.
2:58
Alex
The Commission page lists five CubeSats, tiny satellites, and one experiment on board.
3:05
Jordan
And this is where the victory line stops short.
3:09
Alex
Isar says it is working with customers to confirm the satellite status.
3:15
Jordan
Meaning the rocket got to orbit, but we do not yet know whether those satellites are working.
3:22
Alex
Orbit was the exam. Delivery is only fully useful when the cargo checks in.
3:28
Jordan
So I will give them the launch and keep one hand off the victory banner until the customers answer.
3:35
Alex
Sovereignty, pending a status page.
3:40
Jordan
Napoleon Jones, a Navy veteran, recorded a traffic stop from a private lot in Sussex, Wisconsin, on May fourth, 2025.
3:49
Alex
Deputy Brandon Shayhorn stopped Jones over an unreadable temporary plate, pulled him from his car, and jailed him for five hours.
3:57
Jordan
Jones left with no citation and no charge. An internal memo later said the stop was illegal because it happened on private property.
4:06
Alex
He filed a complaint. Then the camera searches began.
4:10
Jordan
Flock is a license-plate camera network police can type a plate into. His plate was searched more than a hundred times. The department also had a Flock photo of his white BMW from May thirtieth, twenty-six days after the stop.
4:24
Alex
So this is the search box after somebody complains about a cop.
4:28
Jordan
Yes. The camera does not have to move. The attention does.
4:33
Alex
Who ran the searches?
4:36
Jordan
Shayhorn said under oath in the lawsuit, "I was ordered by Lieutenant Farrell to conduct this search." He said it had to do with the citizen complaint.
4:45
Alex
Wait. The deputy named in the complaint was told to search the person who complained?
4:51
Jordan
That is what the deposition says.
4:54
Alex
So the complaint process was supposed to investigate the stop, and instead it also gave the subject of the complaint access to...
5:03
Jordan
To the plate history.
5:06
Alex
No.
5:07
Jordan
A captain who also searched Jones said you do not normally let the deputy under complaint join that investigation.
5:15
Alex
Good. Then the system knew the boundary.
5:19
Jordan
The written Flock policy says department staff may use the data only for legitimate law enforcement purposes.
5:26
Alex
A rule that becomes optional when the complaint is about your own department is not a control. It is a sentence in a file.
5:35
Jordan
The thread asks whether the audit log proves the system worked. We know about the searches because the log exists.
5:43
Alex
That is useful evidence. It is not prevention.
5:47
Jordan
Exactly. Accountability that starts after more than a hundred searches is late.
5:54
Alex
And we need the legal line here. This is a federal lawsuit. It is not a criminal verdict against the deputy or the department.
6:02
Jordan
But the sequence is documented: record a stop, get detained, file a complaint, then become a repeated search.
6:10
Alex
The buried risk is not only where a plate camera stands. It is who gets to type your plate, and what they call legitimate after you challenge them.
6:20
Alex
Story three. Developer Jeff Johnson tested Chrome 152.0.7977.83 on two Macs.
6:29
Jordan
He was not signed into Google, and DuckDuckGo was his search engine.
6:34
Alex
He turned on the setting that says Chrome should delete site data when every window closes. Then he ran one Google search, closed the only window, quit Chrome, and opened it again.
6:45
Jordan
Google dot com was still there. Its cookies and other site data remained on the machine.
6:51
Alex
That data can hold identifiers and other details between visits.
6:56
Alex
Other sites in his test were gone. Johnson says Google was the one exception.
7:02
Jordan
Is that a privacy disaster, or one odd test on two Macs?
7:08
Alex
One careful reproduction by one developer. The thread is thin. We do not have Google admitting a deliberate exception.
7:16
Jordan
Johnson does not claim a signed conspiracy either. He says assume a mistake first.
7:22
Alex
But the result is familiar. He found the same behavior in 2020, and Google fixed it after his post.
7:30
Jordan
So the user says "delete when I close," and Chrome says...
7:34
Alex
Delete everyone except the company that ships Chrome.
7:39
Jordan
That is the part you would reject in a product review.
7:43
Alex
I would not close that ticket. If the vendor's own data survives, the setting does not do what it says.
7:49
Jordan
Even if it is a bug?
7:51
Alex
Especially then. Intent changes the blame. It does not change the data left on the disk.
7:57
Jordan
And the setting has a clear trigger. Close every window, then delete the data.
8:03
Jordan
Okay, I was about to make this a motive question. It is a behavior question first.
8:08
Alex
Exactly. We do not need a secret plan to test a plain promise.
8:14
Jordan
Close all windows should mean close all windows. Delete site data should include the browser maker's own site.
8:22
Alex
The test is narrow. The promise is not.
8:26
Jordan
Google may explain or fix it. Until then, Chrome's cleanup rule is failing on Google's own site.
8:34
Alex
The landlord kept a key.
8:38
Jordan
U.S. staff at the Wikimedia Foundation voted for union representation in a National Labor Relations Board election counted September third.
8:47
Alex
Staff, not the volunteer editors who write Wikipedia.
8:51
Jordan
Right. These are employees at the nonprofit that keeps the sites running. They voted to join CWA Local 9415.
9:00
Alex
WIRED reports the count was 158 to 14.
9:05
Jordan
The Foundation says it will bargain in good faith. There is no contract yet.
9:10
Alex
Then why did workers have to vote again?
9:14
Jordan
In July, workers signed cards saying they wanted a union. Management refused to recognize the cards and required a secret government-run vote instead.
9:24
Alex
The nonprofit that asks the world to trust open collaboration wanted one more verification step.
9:31
Jordan
I knew you would say that.
9:34
Alex
Is it wrong?
9:36
Jordan
A little too neat. A secret ballot is a lawful process. The sharper point is that management made workers prove the same support twice.
9:45
Alex
Fair. Cards first, vote second, bargaining still ahead.
9:50
Jordan
And the workers' own FAQ answers "why now" with rapid advances in artificial intelligence, shifting priorities, and changes in how people find and read information.
10:02
Alex
The AI line is not on the Foundation's announcement.
10:07
Jordan
No. It is the workers saying they want a legal voice before those choices settle around them.
10:14
Alex
Because if search engines and chatbots answer without sending people to Wikipedia, the Foundation has to decide what work, funding, and staffing look like.
10:23
Jordan
And Wikipedia is still the page kids actually open when a teacher says, "Start somewhere." In ed-tech, people pitch the answer box. The source page is where you can still follow the links.
10:34
Alex
So the people keeping that page alive see discovery changing and want bargaining rights before the org chart changes with it.
10:43
Jordan
Yes, but let me stop before I make the vote sound like a contract. It is not. It gives them a seat for the negotiation.
10:53
Alex
Not an outcome. Leverage.
10:56
Jordan
The vote was overwhelming. The hard part starts when 158 to 14 has to become actual terms.
11:05
Alex
Doubt the friendly nonprofit halo. Then doubt anyone selling a union vote as the finish line.
11:13
Alex
That's our audit for today. Find us wherever you get your podcasts. Chief Skeptic Officer, every day at seven A.M. New York time.
11:20
Jordan
Tell us what you're skeptical about. Drop it in the comments. The angle you can't stop chewing on.
11:26
Alex
Stay curious. Stay skeptical.
11:29
Jordan
Doubt both.
