The Flock Surveillance Network (ft. Dante & David Covucci) | Macrodosing - Aug 20, 2026

Macrodosing: Arian Foster and PFT Commenter - Barstool Sports

In this episode of Macrodosing, hosts Arian Foster and Dante Covucci dive into the controversial rise of autonomous food delivery robots, discussing their

Key takeaways

• Food delivery robots are increasingly seen as unnecessary and disruptive, clogging sidewalks and replacing low-income jobs without clear societal benefit.
• The proliferation of autonomous machines reflects a larger trend toward corporate self-regulation, where companies influence laws to favor automation over human labor.

Main topics

• Autonomous food delivery robots
• Urban disruption and sidewalk safety

Notable quotes

"They're unnecessary for one. Two, they're taking people's jobs that really don't make a lot of money as it is." – Dante Covucci

"The story's moving at a million miles an hour... I think this is a positive sign for society that we're reacting the way we are." – Dante Covucci

Conclusion

The episode underscores growing public unease with unchecked technological advancement, particularly in urban environments

Transcript preview

Speaker 2 (0:00) Hey, MacroDosing listeners, you can find us every Tuesday and Thursday on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or YouTube. Prime members can listen ad-free on Amazon Music. If your hair isn't performing like it used to, the answer isn't another hat. It's a proactive approach. Nutrafol is the number one dermatologist-recommended hair growth supplement brand. It's also NSF-certified for sport and the official hair growth partner of Major League Baseball, the only hair growth supplement trusted by the pros. Visit Nutrafol.com. Enter promo code PMT. Get $10 off your first month subscription and you get free shipping. That's N-U-T-R-A-F-O-L dot com. Promo code PMT. Speaker 5 (0:39) At Boar's Head, we've been going back to school for over 115 years. And this year, every school lunch is reason to celebrate with the flavors your kids love and the exceptional quality you expect. Helping you make school lunch fresh, easy, and delicious. Ring the bell. The deli is open. Speaker 5 (1:05) Boar's Head, committed to craft since 1905. Speaker 2 (1:08) Was Tucker Speaker 7 (1:10) Carlson's new take that he unleashed. I Speaker 1 (1:13) love the take. Speaker 7 (1:14) Yeah, it's a great Speaker 2 (1:14) take. And as far as takes go, he's still out there doing Speaker 4 (1:17) his thing. Speaker 1 (1:18) I'm wondering which one you're referring to. And if I know. I Speaker 4 (1:21) didn't know there were multiple. Speaker 8 (1:22) There's multiple good takes from Tucker Speaker 2 (1:24) recently. Speaker 8 (1:25) The nukes. Speaker 1 (1:26) What about? Speaker 8 (1:27) Oh, so you don't know about the nukes? Speaker 1 (1:29) Not being real? Speaker 8 (1:31) No, that they weren't made by humans. Speaker 1 (1:33) Oh, miss this one. Enlighten me. Fill us in. Speaker 2 (1:50) Welcome back to Macrodosing. It is Thursday. It is August 20th. Speaker 5 (1:56) Hey, it's Ria from Chicks in the Office. When I think of denim, I think of Abercrombie. It's just that iconic. I mean, I practically live in Abercrombie denim at this point. Their high-rise 90s relax is my go-to everyday jeans when I'm in the city. And I've been wearing their low-rise ultra-loose out in Soho. Love it. With a cute top and a kitten heel for dinner. Between classic fit and the viral curve love fit that eliminates waist gap, there's literally a pair for everyone. It's truly denim made iconic. Shop Abercrombie Denim and more in the app, online, and in stores. Speaker 2 (2:30) And we're back in studio. We got Dante the Don joining us today. Speaker 1 (2:33) Yo, yo. Hammer Don. Thanks, guys. Has anybody Speaker 2 (2:37) ever called you that, like a nickname? Speaker 1 (2:38) No, I kind of like it, though. Hammer Don. Got a good ring. Speaker 2 (2:41) Yeah, you try it. Let's say it together. One, two, three. Hammer Don. That's Speaker 7 (2:45) what Speaker 2 (2:45) they're calling you. Speaker 7 (2:46) Nice. Speaker 2 (2:47) That's pretty good. Speaker 1 (2:47) Let's make that sick. Speaker 2 (2:49) Arian, have you got a chance to listen to any new music recently? Speaker 7 (2:54) I have. I mean, maybe. I don't know. Why? There's a new album that came out. I was wondering if you had any critiques of it. Speaker 6 (3:02) I haven't. What new album? Speaker 2 (3:04) Pat McAfee album. Speaker 6 (3:06) I have not spun it. It's good. Speaker 7 (3:08) What Speaker 2 (3:09) is it called? The Diary of a Polarizing Figure? I believe that's correct. Speaker 6 (3:13) He's Speaker 2 (3:13) pretty polarizing. Very polarizing, yeah. Is he, though? Not really. I don't think. Well, I know some people don't like him. No, I think Speaker 4 (3:21) that is fair. Yeah, it is. I think he's polarizing. Come on. Speaker 1 (3:26) Donald Trump is polarizing. Pat McAfee is not polarizing. You Speaker 8 (3:30) don't think there's plenty of people that don't like Pat McAfee? Do you have the reception to his? album you don't think is indicative of that i think there are plenty of people that do not like pat mcafee Speaker 7 (3:40) that you could also have a positive or negative response to his album just that's true based on the music but Speaker 8 (3:46) i think generally he has a very large audience adjective Speaker 7 (3:49) or verb Speaker 6 (3:50) form of polarize it often describes something that causes people to split into two strong opposing groups i wouldn't i wouldn't categorize pat mcafee as It's like, you either like fuck with him or you're kind of indifferent. I don't know anybody that's like, yo, fuck Pat McAfee. No, I'm against it. I know him, so it's like, he's always been cool with me. I don't have no problems with him. Speaker 8 (4:11) I don't know that there's anyone that hates him, like personally, but I think the proliferation of Pat McAfee across every medium, I think is something that a lot of people dislike. Yeah, I Speaker 2 (4:22) think people are, there are some people that don't like the fact that he's everywhere. But I think that those voices are amplified online to a point where they're a Speaker 7 (4:29) very, very small percentage as opposed to in real life. I don't think it's polarizing. That could be Speaker 8 (4:35) true, but Speaker 7 (4:35) I... Because Speaker 2 (4:36) he amplifies a lot of those too. Obviously, if you're Pat and you've got people coming after you, you feel the need to defend yourself sometimes. He feels the need so much that he definitely gives amplification to the people that don't like him. He made a whole album about him. Speaker 6 (4:54) Oh, this is Speaker 2 (4:54) a Speaker 6 (4:54) fuck my haters out? Pretty much, yeah. Pete, I'm Speaker 2 (5:00) going to put it on in the background while we... There you go. But we got Dante the Don joining us, making his much-anticipated return to the show. And we also have Foyaball joining us in a little bit. Check out the Twitter account, Foyaball. Very interesting follow to talk to us a little bit about flock cameras. And Dante, you texted me a couple weeks ago that Speaker 1 (5:24) you Speaker 2 (5:24) wanted to do an episode on the flock cameras. I Speaker 1 (5:27) was shocked you guys hadn't already. And I went down into YouTube and... gave it a look and I was like, I think this would be a very good topic to bring up on the show. Speaker 2 (5:39) Was there a moment that, because the text kind of came out of nowhere. What was going on in Dante's life that you were like, I'm going to text PFT and see if I can do an episode on this. Speaker 1 (5:49) So I've been working on a blog on the subject and it's, I don't have a lot of time to sit down and dedicate to it and I don't want to just throw something up that's half ass. So when I go back to it, so much has happened and come out in the time since I last sat down to write it. I mean, this... The story's moving at a million miles an hour. It caught fire. It's one of the few things that's happened in the past year that I've actually been like, all right, I think this is a positive sign for society that we're reacting the way we are as a population to something. Speaker 2 (6:30) That and the food delivery robots. Dante's made a... Anytime Dante sees one of those things, you Speaker 1 (6:37) kick it. They made my blood boil. Speaker 2 (6:39) Have you gotten in trouble for that? Speaker 1 (6:41) Yeah, I did. I'll speak Speaker 2 (6:46) for you. Word of advice. If you choose to knock one over, don't do it on camera and then post it to social media. Correct. That Speaker 1 (6:53) was Nikki Smokes who filmed and posted that, of course. What do you Speaker 8 (6:56) hate about the robots so much? Speaker 1 (6:59) They're unnecessary for one. Two, they're taking people's jobs that really don't make a lot of money as it is. Are those the people we need to replace the jobs of? Three, they clog up sidewalks and traffic. They go out in the middle of the road. It's just one of those things that I feel like, I don't know. I don't know how those were allowed. Speaker 1 (7:34) When like the city was so against electronic scooters, not that I'm like a huge scooter fan, but they were so opposed to granting licenses to Lime and those companies for scooters. And they allow them in like two neighborhoods in the city. But these fucking robots are everywhere. And I don't know if you've noticed, probably not. You're going to think I'm crazy. But when they first showed up, they were very. like dormant like they didn't move if they if there were people like if there was foot traffic they definitely didn't move now they're getting so comfortable like they're learning machines they really are the robots are too comfortable they are now Speaker 7 (8:16) they're like swerving they're doing the thing on the bike where they go at people and then swerve at the last second Speaker 1 (8:20) now they go right like you can be walking they fucking are hauling down the sidewalk Speaker 2 (8:25) i love those videos arian They're ridiculous. None of those kids are assholes. Yeah, the kids are complete assholes for doing it, but they make me laugh whenever I see people losing their minds behind it. Speaker 6 (8:37) I wouldn't get mad if that was done to me, but I could see how that could piss somebody off. Right, Speaker 2 (8:41) if it's done to a kid or a lady or something like that. Older people would, but if it did it to me, I'd Speaker 6 (8:45) probably play Speaker 2 (8:46) some Speaker 6 (8:47) defense. Speaker 2 (8:47) It's the new knockout game. I've seen videos of kids riding bikes, like going at people. Oh, with like Speaker 8 (8:54) wheelies and stuff. Yeah, wheels. Oh, I've seen that. Yeah, that would piss me off. It's Speaker 2 (8:57) very dangerous, but also like people's, they're losing their minds when they see the videos. But Dante, people, I see your point because back in like the 90s, people, the way that they treated skateboarders. Speaker 1 (9:12) Great point. And Speaker 2 (9:13) now you've got these robots that are like licensed to work on every city street. I also think a problem with these new. like food delivery robots, is the more ingrained they get in our cities, the more into the entire economy of America, the more those companies will be writing laws for themselves to favor more robots and bigger robots until the entire city, like the postman, are going to be robots. Yep. Speaker 1 (9:40) Going door to door. Shocked that hasn't happened yet. Now Speaker 8 (9:44) that Speaker 1 (9:44) you say that. Speaker 8 (9:45) I think it's Uber I saw is going to start using drones for food delivery. Oh, Speaker 2 (9:49) good. Speaker 1 (9:51) Or at least that's their plan. And it's like, dude, I don't know how many Uber drivers you know or Uber delivery people you know, but these people can, they work, they get capped at the hours they can work and they're barely scraping by. And it's just, I don't know, I think it's just really, really shitty that these companies are trying to trim margins in the places they're trying to trim and increase. profit margins the way they're trying to increase them but Speaker 1 (10:23) To your point about this expanding from food delivery into other aspects, I was with a guy at the Cubs game last night who was showing me an email. I sent it to myself and I wanted to post it, but he was begging me not to because he was like, I'm going to get kicked out of my country club. He belongs to a golf course where the grounds crew has been replaced by robots. They have robot lawnmowers. That Speaker 7 (10:50) sucks. Speaker 1 (10:51) How Speaker 7 (10:52) about Speaker 1 (10:52) replaced though, right? Dude, he showed them to me and they sent an email out because people were tipping them over. Kids. And they were like, because they were like, fuck this. Like our favorite guy lost his job. He's replaced by a fucking robot lawnmower. And they had to send an email out and they were like, if you get caught. doing one of this like you'll be like expelled or whatever Speaker 4 (11:15) um Speaker 1 (11:17) and i was like wait explain this to me and he showed me pictures and i was i don't know i i don't golf at the nicest places so maybe this is commonplace but i was shocked to see it it was big red and white and yeah it's pretty much he said it's like automated to the whole course like it knows what length to cut it exactly where it's some company that comes out and maps every inch of a golf course and then sells these machines and just replace your workforce go out Speaker 7 (11:49) Yeah, I don't like it. Speaker 1 (11:50) Hate it. I Speaker 7 (11:51) don't like it at all. But Dante's on the front lines against these robots. Speaker 1 (11:55) Hate it. Speaker 2 (11:55) Glad to have you back on the program. Team Speaker 1 (11:58) human. Speaker 8 (11:59) Arian sounded like he was a little pro robot lawnmower there, just from what I Speaker 6 (12:02) hear. No, no, no. I don't think it's at the space where it's actually taking jobs. It will supplement it from here to there, especially in range collection things, too. There are some. you know i don't think we're at the place where it's replacing but it's yeah it's gearing it's getting towards i'm not pro robot but the flip side though is if you kick a robot that's delivering food not somebody that paid money for their food ain't gonna get their food so like it's it's a lose-lose if you kick a robot in my opinion with the food that's right you want to yeah so somebody just ordered they chipotle they chick-fil-a and here you are protesting against the you know uh the robots and now where my food at and i was sitting on side street avenue Speaker 6 (12:49) Also, Speaker 8 (12:50) very little wholesome content left on the internet, but a good food delivery robot getting caught in a funny situation, that still gets me, man. Agreed. When there's one at Tennessee, they're going through the band on like a football Saturday. The band's marching through campus and there's a food delivery. It's good stuff. Yeah, Speaker 4 (13:07) I Speaker 2 (13:07) agree with that. Speaker 8 (13:08) Dante doesn't want that for us. Speaker 2 (13:10) I guess the moral is if you are going to kick over a food delivery robot, one, make sure that Nicky Smokes isn't filming you. Speaker 4 (13:18) Correct. Speaker 2 (13:18) And two, maybe check and see if it's empty. And make sure it's on its way back. Yeah, on its way back. Has Speaker 1 (13:25) anybody actually had one of these show up at their door? No. Me neither. Yes, I have. All right, so what happens? Speaker 5 (13:33) It's pretty fucking cool, right? You go on Uber Eats and it'll say an autonomous driver has your order. It'll refund your tip. Speaker 1 (13:42) Autonomous driver, really? That's the language they use. Speaker 5 (13:45) Yeah, and then it'll refund your tip. because there's no person. So that's the only plus is like I save what? Six, seven dollars on a tip. Speaker 1 (13:54) And then Speaker 5 (13:55) you go downstairs because obviously they can't come up to your door. I have to go outside and then you slide. It'll be like you go on your Uber Eats app and it'll say slide to confirm you are in front of the robot and then you slide like you're unlocking your phone and then the top lid opens up and then you grab the food. And then you say slide to confirm you have picked up your order and then it'll close and drive away. Speaker 2 (14:22) I don't like that. It Speaker 5 (14:24) is weird. I don't like that. They also usually take way longer because it's a little tiny robot. not someone on a bike or a car or anything like that. So there used to be in my old apartment, there used to be a pizza place around the corner from me that I would order sometimes. And every once in a while, if I was being super mega lazy, I would Uber Eats delivery it. And it would take me on my own two feet, about seven minutes to walk there. Again, I'm sounding lazy. I'm saying this, but it would take the robot 25 minutes to robot there and drive. ride there like okay I'm this is stupid I should have just picked it up and I know Speaker 1 (15:05) this like this has nothing to do with the subject of convenience which obviously that's what profit and convenience are at the root of this but I'm also old school and nostalgic in the sense, do we really want to get to a point where you don't interact with another human being face-to-face at all anymore? Because it seems like that's where the road everybody's trying to steer us towards. Speaker 2 (15:30) Yeah. Speaker 1 (15:31) That's Speaker 2 (15:32) the Speaker 1 (15:32) goal. But why? Why do we want to get that? That's the goal. Speaker 2 (15:37) That's the rule now. That was the SNL impression of Tucker Carlson. Did you see Speaker 8 (15:43) his take? He had a take the other day. Speaker 2 (15:45) Yeah, so let's get to that. But real quick, Dante, I think you're right. I was just wondering the other day when I was walking around my neighborhood with my dog, and I knew like one person while I was out on the walk. And I think that if you go back like 30 years, Speaker 1 (16:02) if Speaker 2 (16:03) you go and walk around your neighborhood and the random people that you see on the street, you probably know a good amount of them. Speaker 1 (16:09) For sure. High Speaker 2 (16:10) percentage. But since people are more isolated now in their homes, I feel like that sense of community is going down. Speaker 1 (16:18) Big time. Speaker 2 (16:19) Yeah. But what Big T was alluding to was Tucker Carlson's new take that he unleashed. I Speaker 7 (16:26) love the take. Yeah, it's a Speaker 2 (16:27) great take. And as far as takes go, he's still out there doing Speaker 7 (16:30) his thing. Speaker 1 (16:30) I'm wondering which one you're referring to. And if I know. I Speaker 8 (16:34) didn't know there were multiple. There's multiple good takes from Tucker recently. Speaker 1 (16:37) The nukes. What about? Speaker 8 (16:41) Oh, so you don't know about the nukes? Speaker 1 (16:43) Not being real? Speaker 8 (16:45) No, that they weren't made by humans. Speaker 1 (16:47) Oh, miss this one. Enlighten me. Fill us in. Speaker 8 (16:52) Yeah, he said that that's literally the extent of what he said. He said nukes were not made by man and that once we got however we received the information to make nuclear weapons, that's when man abandoned God. Speaker 6 (17:06) Is it aliens? Is he saying aliens maybe? I Speaker 8 (17:08) believe that's the implication, yes. The guy he was interviewing, I don't know who it was, was like, so you wouldn't watch Oppenheimer? He's like, I'd never watch that crap. I wouldn't let that into my head. Speaker 7 (17:19) I wouldn't watch that crap. Christopher Nolan? Speaker 1 (17:24) You know what's interesting about that is the layer that plays in where there's been all these reports of nuclear silos and... like launch pads being shut down by aliens like aircraft like not that generals went to fire them or whatever but at like heightened tensions when they went to arm them or whatever ufos would be in the area and they would yeah like be jammed or shut down and they were always like yeah it's ufos like hacking into the system or overpowering them or deactivating them or whatever That's a very interesting. Speaker 7 (18:08) There's been a shitload of those reports, yeah. Also, what's crazy is if you go and look at the different broken arrow events, a broken arrow is when a Speaker 2 (18:15) nuke is either lost or like it accidentally goes off or something like that. In the history of the United States, there have been dozens. Speaker 1 (18:24) Really? Speaker 2 (18:25) Yeah, where like a plane has broken up midair. There's one, I think, I want to say it's off Tybee Island in Georgia, and there's definitely one in... In North Carolina. The one in North Carolina is crazy because I think it was a B-52 that was carrying two nukes, I think. And the plane broke apart in midair. Oh, Speaker 1 (18:44) my God. And Speaker 2 (18:45) they both landed. One of the bombs landed and it was like a hydrogen bomb. It was like a powerful fucking bomb. It landed in a field in North Carolina in about like 20 feet of mud. It dropped straight down, got stuck in the field. All the safety measures. On this bomb, and there are several safety measures, all of them either didn't work because of the plane breaking up or they malfunctioned. And there was one single fuse that was left in place that kept the bomb from exploding. Speaker 1 (19:16) No way. And Speaker 2 (19:17) taking out like all of central North Carolina. Speaker 1 (19:20) No way. And Speaker 2 (19:21) it got buried so deep in the mud there that they couldn't evacuate it or excavate it safely. So it's still there. And the government bought up all the land around it. Are you shitting me? I swear to God, look it up. When was this? I want to say the 50s, either the 50s or 60s or 70s. One of those, somewhere in that 30 year period. They have you Speaker 1 (19:42) for sure. Yeah. You think they would be a little more careful. Speaker 2 (19:45) There's another one in Tybee Island, Georgia. Speaker 2 (19:50) And there was one in Japan where we had a nuclear submarine that had nukes on it. And it sank. And then we didn't tell the government of Japan that we had a nuclear weapon there. And then we're like, hey, sorry, but there's a Speaker 7 (20:02) nuke somewhere at the bottom of your ocean. Speaker 2 (20:06) Whoopsie. Oops, my bad. Hope that's cool. Speaker 8 (20:10) So how do we think, or not we, how does Tucker think we acquired the knowledge? Because he doesn't dispute, I would assume, that at some point, A, your multiple men. put together the nuclear weapon right yeah i mean Speaker 7 (20:27) there were a lot of like a lot of companies that have a lot of people working on different parts of these but maybe it's so siloed part of the pun that when you're uh when you're making a bomb it's not like it's one company in one department but Speaker 8 (20:40) at some point the the information had to be relayed supernaturally to someone yeah Speaker 2 (20:47) Yeah, who got the message. Right. And if it wasn't, I assume in that case, it would not be like ancient knowledge how to make nukes because we didn't have them until recently. Speaker 1 (20:58) You're right. 1961, B-52, Goldsboro, North Carolina. There Speaker 6 (21:02) we go. Holy shit. They just figured we were ready. Yeah. As a society. You guys have ascended to, there's this Star Trek. part where a society reaches when a society on a planet reaches interstellar capability Star Trek comes to greet them and say hey there's a whole interplanetary society out here and we traverse the stars you guys are now in a gang that's what they did to us with the nooks you guys are ready to blow each other the fuck up let's get it in yeah Speaker 7 (21:36) they were wrong you're Speaker 2 (21:38) ready for this it's like you see your kid and you're like okay you're ready you're ready to have your first beer or knowing Speaker 1 (21:44) or or hear me out or school yeah whoops or we were given the technology for positive purposes and we turned it into a weapon like we do with fucking everything and that is why the aliens every time we try to use it, shut it down. They abandon it. And whatnot. We should have used it for Speaker 6 (22:08) the hurricanes. Like it was intended. Correct. Yeah. Speaker 2 (22:12) Yeah. Good point. It's like people always say that the biggest driver of technology is porn. Have you ever heard that? No. There's a lot of technology that's widely used out there that was created because companies wanted to figure out ways to break through some porn innovation, like VR, streaming, Speaker 7 (22:35) video Speaker 2 (22:36) players online, things like that. I think Dante might be. It's either porn or killing. Speaker 1 (22:43) Yeah, I thought it was military. Yeah, Speaker 2 (22:44) military. See, if it's not for jacking off, it's for murder. Right? Speaker 1 (22:48) That's fucking great. The Speaker 2 (22:50) big two. Speaker 8 (22:52) August is the perfect time to hit reset before the autumn rush begins. And honestly, I can't think of a better place to start than my closet. That's why I love shopping at Quince. Quince is all about fewer, better pieces. Their clothes are made with premium materials built to last and designed to become the ones you reach for day after day. I've got plenty of good Quince stuff in my closet, and we're talking about clothes. I did just get, I mentioned this last time, I got a new comforter from Quince as well because I