 Thank you for coming to what time is it now? It's a super early morning talk, right? And as demonstrated by the fact that the person who I'm speaking with is currently recovering outside, so And hopefully if he does come in and I hope he does it make sure to be very welcome into him because this will be his first time Helping to do a talk of some sort and we're both here for the same reason as you can see the title there of why Americans are moving to Germany and such and There are two primary Audiences for this talk and two reasons that we're given it The first is that things are getting really bad in the US right now and you guys may have how many people here know who Snowden is for example Okay, easy crowd So that's one there's actually a lot more stuff going on that will try which will try to cover within this talk And on the other side we want to show There are maybe a lot of Americans who are on the precipice of well I feel hopeless or life is not going so well What should I do? Oh, do I have a way out? and This is kind of a call for help and maybe even reaching out to the community of Germany because there are some really great things that I have found here in the years that I've been coming to Congress and so on and I I myself have moved to Germany as about a month ago So I'm still in the honeymoon phase and I can go over some of the details or we get into so this talk is Intended both for the Americans looking to jump ship as well as the Germans who are wondering well What's so great about Germany anyways? Did that change? Ah, there we go. So, yeah I don't know how many of you have seen this news article and this is indicative of probably at least many of you are probably aware of The title of Berlin's digital exiles where a lot of people are coming over right now and in this case, it's to escape the NSA and the surveillance apparatus that has come along and There's some really bad stuff going on. So What is the problem? So here's a big one and this is actually the wealth inequality in the US has been going on for a very long time And I could get I could go on for an entire hour about all the socio-economic reasons But as you can see here those are the poor people and The rich are actually so rich that if you you can't even see the top of it Like we say it in with Occupy if you guys remember that we had the 1% and the 99% Well, it's actually closer to the point 00001% and everyone else I think Something like a quarter of America's wealth is concentrated within about 400 rich people Mostly the Walton family and whatnot and there's also an illustrative photo here You can see there's a homeless man next to a really rich man And there's this really unhealthy juxtapose that's going on and my own personal story I'm coming from the San Francisco Bay Area and There have it there's some really bad wealth inequality issues going on there right now and there's a housing crisis and there's also the Weather issues and whatnot, but it's important to note that this is not a new thing This has been a creeping problem that has been happening over the course of decades It's been a series of really maybe poorly thought-out laws that have been enacted Thanks Reagan and thanks Bush for example So the problem that means is that it's a very deep-rooted issue and it's not going to go away anytime soon Beyond that we also have corporate power. So on the right here are on the left here By the way, one of the things I will get to in a bit Germany has amazing health insurance and health coverage America's is effectively non-existent. It might as well be a third world country I have another hour-long rant about that, but you got the little comic on the left side there And on the right side there's two comments I want to make about that image up top first you see the political parties the Democrat and Republican the elephant in the Donkey where they're effectively hailing allegiance to the party and not actually have in a discussion and that kind of Describes the political gridlock that's going on in the US right now between Congress which is controlled by Republicans and The White House which is Democratic, which means they're basically not doing anything And it's actually led to a government shut down among other things But the other more nefarious point that's involved It's not actually a political party issue because they don't work for their respective parties They work for the corporations who are given the money to pay for their campaigns For example Hillary Clinton who recently announced that she was running She was whole enough for several months and years really saying that she was announcing her bid for presidency Because if you have not yet officially announced you're going to run for president You're not officially campaigning which means you are not subject to campaign finance laws Which means the the Clinton Foundation was able to pull in all kinds of money And I think that they have raised over a billion dollars So it's basically going to be this next 2016 presidential debate or presidential race It's going to be the Democrats namely Hillary Clinton and all the rich people that gave her money and the GOP as funded by the Koch brothers and if you notice the US citizens are not really included in here anywhere and that's kind of the the feeling and kind of the resentments that have been brewing up and The other thing that relates to a lot of you is There's a lot called the computer fraud and abuse act have you guys heard of it at all? So this dates back so question. Have you any of you seen the movie war games? Yeah from 1983 Matthew Broderick and all that so one of the things that happened after war games came out It scared a bunch of politicians and in 1986 they passed this law called the computer fraud and abuse act So remember computers and networking in the 80s were very different Which means that instead of like logging into Google and such as we have now you actually had to make a dial-up connection To another computer and so on so this phrase in here knowingly knowingly accessed a computer without authorized or exceeding authorized access made sense in 1986 and not so much today and there are a number of instances of people who are being tried under this and My the person who is outside recovering right now is one of them And he has a story that hopefully he'll be able to share I guess I could give a little bit of his story though. He was part of the PayPal 14. Are you guys familiar with that? so when WikiLeaks happened in 2010 it pissed off a lot of politicians especially and It was PayPal among other places effectively blockaded payment processing go into WikiLeaks and similar organizations and My co-speaker was one of the people who got involved by taking political action and DDoS and PayPal and This created a whole bunch of problems and long story short He has a whole story about how he was rated by the FBI for it And a bunch of people were grouped in this room and collectively became known as the PayPal 14 Ironically they all became good friends out of this like they didn't really kind they kind of sort of knew each other It was a community but they became good friends after all of the the legal issues which he is still dealing with and honestly One of the reasons which he would say that he has moved to Germany is because if he applies for a job he puts in his application and the employer then Googles his name and They Google his name and the result is the PayPal 14 lawsuit and American employers are terrified of liability and they don't want to get sued for anything and they're basically Anything even remotely controversial is toxic to them so they see this major lawsuit and you know years-long trial and whatnot and Let's just say that he is having trouble finding work and things are much more open and hospitable in Germany for him And it's not just him. There are other people involved in the same thinking of Chelsea Manning I'm thinking of Jeremy Hammond and many more and one of the problems with this law and the way it's being applied Right now, by the way, it's stifling security research and I could get into some of that in a bit, too So why Germany? Well, I am biased because I've been coming to the CCC the Congress since 25 C3 was my first I helped out with the the Sputnik project if you guys saw that or FAD tracking and We've also found the community here to be incredibly welcoming and everyone is very nice and also the health care the fact that I'm a bit speechless because the health care here is just unbelievably amazing the fact that people are not worried that if they get Into an accident or get sick then they might go bankrupt or or otherwise or get denied health care claims and so on There are a lot of problems with America and a lot of those simply don't exist in Germany Admittedly, Obamacare when it went through in 2010 it did fix a lot of things so for example the pre-existing conditions issue wherein if you have a pre-existing condition of any illness or Element insurance companies simply would not cover you they would just deny you so you would go to the hospital and you would either get Turned away because you didn't have health insurance or you get would get a bill for a hundred and fifty thousand dollars So that's just kind of how it is in the US The only way to really get health insurance is to have a job Which is also why the whole situation with the job transience and job insecurity makes people afraid It's not just the economic risks It's because if you lose your job you lose your health insurance and that's a death trap another thing. That's really interesting so There are really very few public places left in the United States So for example Occupy Wall Street that was held in Zuccotti Park in New York City That was actually privately owned and that was one of the reasons they were able to clear it out I think the UN plaza in San Francisco correct me if I'm wrong Mitch is that a public place? So there are a few but they're being eroded away one of the reasons for example I think that hacker spaces have been so popular is because We like to have places to hang out and to associate and get to know our communities and at the moment in the US most of that is like Starbucks and Most of it you have to pay to exist or you have to be there for with a purpose instead of hanging out and get into No people and such so it's something very powerful and the other thing is the KS computer club and perhaps It might be hard to understand how amazing this is if you're used to it and take it for granted But the CCC is one of the most amazing organizations I've ever found partly because there's a community and partly because they look beyond just the technology They use technology as a means to other things and in the US We sort of have that so we have the electronic frontier foundation, which is very useful But kind of limited in scope and it's it's for those unfamiliar It's a collective of lawyers who help defend people who have been accused of computer related crimes such as the CFAA and we also have Some organizations like 2,600 and a few other things But there is nothing as robust and also as universally respected as the CCC seems to be in the US Computer hackin is viewed as nefarious as criminal and I think that's one of the reasons We're seeing all these prosecutions and it's also because the prosecutors want to make a name for themselves Whereas here it seems that people are open to it and they like the exploration of computers. Am I rambling on too much? What's it? Okay. Yes, and I fully admit in some of this talk the grass may be greener and remember I'm in my honeymoon period But this is what we get if we try to stand up in the streets If you don't know what this is a lot of local police municipalities in the country in America And this is mostly because of Occupy and they're trying to figure out what the hell do we do? Mirrors of the different American cities actually had conference calls with Department of Homeland Security about this So the DHS has been taking excess equipment that I guess the military didn't need anymore and Given it as in the form of grants to local law enforcement. So this one is in Tampa This is a police tank that is rolled out to break up protests. They're going on nonviolent protests I have personally seen tanks like this in the streets when I was involved in Occupy Oakland as a legal observer And it's fucking scary. So you have this you also have police wearing the riot gear and the tear gas And I don't know if you guys have been tear gas, but it's really not fun And you know what the funding for all this stuff is coming from DHS and I just want to show you the face of this woman I've forgotten her name and this was taken from I think Occupy Portland or Occupy Seattle I believe she's a Holocaust survivor actually and she came out because she didn't like what was going on in the US and Her face is covered with mace and that is how American police treat our elders So if you rise up if you dissent if you voice something that is different from the status quo in the United States We'll watch out And that's not all we have in this this is something I could give a very long talk on are you guys familiar with the concept of fusion centers? So fusion centers Something analogous to this could be the London CCTV network where there are cameras on every street corner and they're recording all the license plates And everywhere you go and whatnot so the DHS has been basically in secret funding a lot of these Fusion centers which they have street cameras. They have license plate readers some of them bring in social media feeds They have shot spotter shot spotter is a tool that listens to audio for gunshots And if it determines there is one then it tries to triangulate it and then Some places consider that probable cause to issue a warrant it depends on the state and the municipality so This is fucking scary and this is what's going on in the United States right now on the top You have a guy who's basically playing peep in Tom and watching everything that's going on and just a bit of shameless self-promotion this the DHS did approach Oakland, California where I lived until about a month ago and wanted to set something like this up and the people of Oakland rose up and said no, this is not okay and After seven straight months of protests at City Hall They decided to create an ad hoc committee to create the first privacy policy of its kind in Oakland to fight back against this some overarching Basically tyrannical crap and I was appointed to the committee So I could give like a week-long seminar on all the intricacies of this But basically there are two standards that ought to be used that Snowden in particular has been suggesting we use reasonable suspicion and probable cause anybody versed in law is familiar with those and Those will be incorporated into the Oakland privacy policy None of these other places are doing that so we're hoping that with this policy that we can establish something and set up a system That does help reduce crime and so on and then point to the NSA and all these other fusion centers and by the way Basically every city at this DC Boston Chicago New York They all have them and none of them really seem to have privacy policies at all In fact most citizens of these cities are unaware that these systems have even been set up they usually just kind of slipped by in the private in City Hall meetings and such and All of these things don't really spell happiness and this is where we get people like this is these are pictures the PayPal 14 But it's not just them and actually the top left there is Insane who would be my co-speaker except I think he is hopefully getting better after last night and They're not alone and these are the people who some of them are wondering what do I do? Where can I go and one of the reasons for doing this talk is to show you guys things are not so great in the US right now And if there are people who are looking at like brighter pastures Perhaps we could work together and create a easier process for them because I will say come into Germany is not the easiest thing to do It's besides the fact that it's expensive. There's all these legal things and if you don't have a Basically 40 hours a week to study all the intricacies of German law. It becomes very difficult So some of the things that I really appreciate about Germany and because why the hell are we even looking here? Yeah, yeah, yeah This for example, this does not exist in the United States. It's solely distributed in Germany It depends there's a couple of choice stores through a funny little thing But in general I cannot go to the grocery store and get club maté and as you can imagine I have two cases of it at home right now It is quite good. Also Donner kebab doesn't exist. Oh my god That stuff is so good. I lived off of Donner kebab and club maté for the first week I was here as many I see you smile and I see you guys can relate But there's all kinds of little things like that within Germany and what we have found is that the stress level is just Almost non-existent compared to what we're used to people here seem to have a sense of job security There isn't this notion that well in the United States Most of the states are what we call at will states which means that you can either quit your job for any reason or More importantly, you can be fired at any time for no reason whatsoever and a Lot of yes, the United States does have anti-discrimination laws So you cannot be fired because you're black for example or turned down for a job However, a lot of companies are saying oh well We don't think you're a cultural fit and that that yeah That's kind of a twisted way of doing it all and it's allowed them to do some really horrible things. What's that? Okay, I thought you made a motion everyone So in general things are really tense because if you have very little job security and You're not really sure and there's this idea of loyalty But loyalty doesn't exist if all the companies are run by sociopaths who want to make more and more and more money Without actually giving any money back to the community Which is one of the things that we're dealing with right now In fact a lot of places so two things in San Francisco and New York and a couple of other cities have been happening First the cost of living has been skyrocketing. I didn't put this in the talk, but I found There was somebody who her landlord this was a couple months ago Her rent was like I think 2000 a month which is actually kind of cheap for San Francisco And she got a letter in the mail saying that next month your rent is going to be $8,000 a month so yeah, it was quadrupled and this is completely legal and There are things like rent control if you have rent control However, there is also Ellis Act evictions basically San Francisco law They can evict you from your place if it remains vacant for a year with the intent that they're going to Updown the building and build fancy condos that only tech workers who make over a hundred thousand dollars can afford So that's kind of the the feelings so that doesn't exist here And there's community when I got into Germany I remember because I was first living in Prenslauerburg and in Berlin and Walking down the street and seeing young children Toddlers and and strollers seeing old people. It's something I haven't seen in a very long time and I really liked it there's actually a diversity in a community here and Just all kinds of little things like that people just Okay, I will stop now, but I just I'm really enjoying my time here this far so Those are kind of the reasons that I am seeing obviously there's a lot of things about Germany I do not know yet for example. I didn't know there was a cathedral and cologne until I got here yesterday and it's absolutely gorgeous Yeah, yeah ignorant American So one of the things we're trying to do is create a list of resources if somebody is interested in Learning well is Germany right for me or is there another country? I should look for if I want to do it What do I have to do is is it worth it is life actually going to be better here? And we want to give people the information so they can make a choice like that for themselves but also if you make a choice that means you are not trapped into something that's making you unhappy and Beyond that we have We're trying to put people in contact with lawyers and fixers I think a fixer is somebody who can hook you up with a visa processing thing and There's all kinds of things. I barely understand the stuff myself And the other thing is if somebody we think maybe as a community belongs in the CCC Maybe they're doing really cool art projects or they're a brilliant hacker of some sort But they cannot afford it and maybe it's because like in my co-speaker's situation He cannot get a job because everyone googles his name and finds all this lawsuit stuff that scares them Well if they can't afford to but they should perhaps we should have a process by which we could do Fundraise and to make sure that quality people are able to be part of this community and in general we just These are ways to get in touch with us. Is that oh hi McFly in? General these are some ways to get in touch with us. This is me on Twitter and McFly who's over there That is his jabber and my Co-speaker who is currently out Hopefully get in better is right there so you can get ahold of us and Beyond that we just want to say thank you to a few people here who have been instrumental in helping all of this to become So I think that's basically all I can think of D'Ramble about right now. Are there any questions? Was I too fast a question? Yeah, I'm I'm German so I'm not so familiar with the laws that govern how long you're allowed to stay here What are the conditions if you're just a guest? Are you a tourist? Is it a tourist? So how does that work? Yeah, so if you come in there? I think it's a tourist visa that you're on and you can be here This is complicated. Oh, okay. Yeah, give it to him so I've lived in Germany off and on for About two years over the past six years So right now we're here on the Schengen visa So we have 180 days once you enter the region that you can be within the area But you only can stay within it for 90 days out of the 180 And so you have to leave with whether your 90 days are up or your 180 days are up So if you use all 90 days and one one go that means you then have to leave and you can't come back until the end of the original 180 days So it's effectively a six month visa, but you can only be here for three months out of the six months total But if you play it right you can actually come into the region for like one day leave Come back three months later stay for three months leave for one day come back Stay for another three months, and then you've had six months in the in the region But then you can't come back again for three more months But Getting a work visa here Technically you're not allowed to come to Germany under a tourist visa and get a job under the tourist visa But you can't get a work visa without being in the country to fill out all the paperwork and do the interviews and So it's actually illegal for a person to come in under a tourist visa to do these things But it's also illegal for a company to bring you here without you having done that yet so it's kind of a Catch 22 so everyone comes in under the tourist visa And then they sometimes have to leave and come back and it's a really weird little Step because the tourist visa cannot turn into a work visa But that's pretty easy, and then there's a secondary or like one of the more common visas that I was looking at having It's a self-work visa so you can be a self-employed artist or You know I do open-source hardware and electronics, so this is what I was looking at and they only care about you having 10,000 euros in the bank and So if you can it doesn't even have to be your money, and they even say this if you can raise 10,000 euros in capital to have sit in a bank account for four to six weeks then You know they they generally think that you might be a person that you're not going to get stranded here You know for you to be able to borrow that that kind of money Means that you're not a poor person effectively, which is what they're trying to to keep out But that was the one that I was looking at being here, so yeah Can's command something this normal visa is the same for other countries as well and also for the US I know it the other way around for somebody Is doing this exact other thing he's coming from Germany and working in the US and want to stay there So it's the same the other way around so it's not typically for germ or Europe or something It's not just as we don't go It's significantly easier for an American to just come here and hang out Because I can come here without a job Well, you know, I'm telling them I'm self-employed and I am self-employed but it's still There's no way that somebody can come to the US and just say I'm gonna hang out unless you are very very rich So I think in the US it's like ten million dollars if you have like ten million dollars in a US bank account Actually, it's in Germany to you get a permanent visa if you have two million euros in a German bank. It's not a joke Most countries have this if you're a wealthy person you can stay in almost any country indefinitely But in the US they don't have such a visa is like here where I can have a five-year visa to live here indefinitely So, yeah, yeah things like that or what we need to put on a page and communicate with people so Cuz I knew about a half of what you just said Okay, any other questions ah Mitch, okay, so we're in a place in the world where not all that many decades ago people fled and they went to Well, many went to France Where it seemed like it was a pretty cool place and Not too long later. They found that that was kind of being overrun by the same forces And some of them went to China In fact, I know some people let the China to become more free well, that was back then before you know, they had a Republic and In fact a friend of mine his grandfather went there and And then a few years later They had to flee there and they ended up being in Turkey of all places. So I'm just wondering Right now the United States is kind of a powerful force Europe seems to follow in footstep when with whatever the United States does in France They just enacted their version of the so-called US Patriot Act Here at least there's some pushback with the recent revelations on the NSA spying here but You know, it's known that the NSA and the equivalent of the Secret Service here are just trading their spying data so Wondering if this is this is a really good question So there's a couple of points to make to this and first off the things as Snowden revealed all the NSA stuff is not The worst things going on in the United States right now The worst thing in my opinion are the data brokers like axiom and xperion and trans Union and such because basically if you use Facebook all of your data is being sold to one of them and That has actually led to some issues because I believe Germany has a lot a law called the telemedia act by which Basically all of your data is protected by law in the US. That is not the case in the US your medical your financial your I think your college trans like education records and Ironically enough video rental records are protected and basically everything else is completely fair game And there's all kinds of ways to interpret around that and it's actually the subject of a lawsuit Germany versus Facebook which I I know that was going on a couple years ago I haven't followed up with it, but it was basically over things like that the idea that The idea that these laws are kind of conflicting So one of the differences I want to point out is that I have seen at least in Germany people seem to you much more It's not that they're politically active. It's more that In the US there's this feeling of disconnect that no matter what you do and no matter what you want The federal government is just going to do whatever the hell that they want include and you know wage these horrible wars and such and it seems like at least in Germany there's a sense of community that Thinks that they can make a difference and they actually do go to things like city hall meetings and such and maybe teach technology Or try to get better policies done and so on So it seems to me at the moment that it is stronger here than it is in the US And perhaps that is because I have not seen police tear gas and like pulverized protesters with Tanks in the street, but I don't know what This does exist in Germany too bad as long as you don't use weapons. You usually not arrested Like if you go to Hamburg my city in May 1st or to Berlin and may 1st you will find some strange things going on and there were some protests when they were using This gas at some people sometimes there's really really big protest afterwards not every Protest it depends on the protest as well, but it's not in general accepted Well, the so another thing that I've noticed about Germany that I think is really profound is that there seems to be a very good separation of work and life balance, so It's not just the vacation Although the vacation is amazing the fact that you have encoded in a law that I believe you must have at least four weeks of vacation a year Whereas with America you're lucky if you get two weeks and then you have to kind of fight to Justify going off and taking the vacation because you're costing the employer money by not working for them Just I was going somewhere with that, but I forgot so But there are a lot right right so the work life balance one of the things that we run into in San Francisco in particular And I'm kind of harping at that because that's the area that I have been living in for years And I moved here from in San Francisco a lot of people get a job especially if it's at one of the big places like Google Facebook and so on and Well, they don't really have very good boundaries And they don't have any life outside of their work Which means that their personal identity becomes their job and therefore everything that the company does the company line becomes They and themselves so the idea of actually marching out and protesting something well That requires believing in something that is not necessarily at the party line of your job So it seems that at least in Germany there's a much healthier balance where people are able to have lives outside of work and for example, if you voice a Political opinion you won't get fired from your job here as far as I have seen That happens all the time in the US except that you're just not a cultural fit Any more questions? I cannot tell if you are confused or if it is simply the flat effect of Europeans Just just one more. Um, do you what do you think would be the? Impact of a lot of Americans in Germany and it doesn't have to be Berlin. I mean that cologne school Well What I immediately thought of does everyone know the concept of the September that never ended and so on that was the September of 1993 where a well came online and suddenly people flooded in the internet and the the culture of usenut and everything else began to drain away So there is a risk of that I think as long as a flood it would be controlled and there will be people who Volunteer and are willing to act as mediators to make sure that people are both taken care of and they learn the cultural boundaries and I guess notions and learn how to respect them. I think that it could be very peaceful So for example One thing that Americans are very guilty of is walking into a store in Europe and trying to pay with American dollars because they For don't realize that other countries have different currency. So it's so fucking stupid that actually happens So did that answer the question at all? so Some of it we just don't know because yeah, you know clearly, you know any city would would profit from an influx of a lot of you know Gifted intelligent, you know people who want to do something and and I'm just trying to picture Berlin and how it would or any city how it would be changed if you Started coming in larger numbers Well, the and the reason I say Berlin is just because I know people in Berlin I've been to Berlin for you know Congress at BCC and such So the issue there is I just don't know enough about Germany and enough about the cities That's why we're reaching out to you guys to see if people have more information to share So well, I think if you watch the internet and have some friends in America You will realize that there actually are a lot of Americans in different phases from Being slightly interested in moving to Germany to I really want to GTFO here. How do I do this? But I don't think it's the numbers that would come close to the eternal September So I think I spread it between Hamburg Berlin and Cologne and maybe one or two other cool cities in Germany Does anyone here still have a stack of the AOLC's from like the mid 90s. Yeah They're good for coasters They still work the oils from CDs from the 90s. There are a few AOL dial-up subscribers still sticking around so Do you think we should do this for people from other countries as well? I mean, you're talking about America specifically But there are people that actually have to flee their country because they're persecuted for some reason and I think this is a great thing that you're trying to set up here But maybe we could just broaden it for other people Yes, and the reason that I have not mentioned that is because I am not from those other countries And I don't want to speak on their behalf, but I think that yes, it's a very welcome discussion What did that not answer the question? Oh, okay Like somebody from Syria, I've never been to Syria and I don't know that much about the culture except for all the horrible things That I see in the news and I don't think that would be very prudent of me or right and just to speak on their behalf So I'm a little worried that we wouldn't be that welcoming as we are to Americans either so Any other questions? Yes, maybe this is also a little bit answering the other question because I think in Germany we are They're getting people from different directions different countries and we have a More mixed country from the population than only Americans. So if there would be a lot of Americans that Maybe would be balanced with other countries as well Yeah, and this is just a kind of a hypothetical thinking ground I mean beyond that how can Germany or people within who have that kind of stability Offer support to people who are in America who do not desire to come here But want to help to say rain back all the horrible things that are going on right now So it's a group effort one of the points with like I need to possibly say I'm half Guilty for this talk too because one of the ideas was to actually make people here also where That there are people basically fleeing their country and living in my couch who are not also from the classical refugee countries that I think most intelligent and thinking and People who are open-minded and see their city and what's going on. I think we have a lot of that in Hamburg at the moment but if you Just are surrounded by those people and just bring up the idea of who there are other people who have legal issues like the guy living On my couch who basically also fled America Who are supposed to stand there and talk if we didn't enjoy Germany too much. I assume But yeah, one of the points is to make people aware that yes refugees are there and a lot of them come over the military and CO in other ways But we will and this is Not so obvious also of refugees from other countries like a America and this if you look in the media It's by far not the first ones And if you happen to see a guy walking around who looks kind of pale and maybe sickly you should ask him How it was when the FBI raided his place? How do your friends in the US react on your decision or your plans, it's very mixed some of them are Either supportive or jealous because maybe they have been over for Congress or something or they want to come to Europe and they've never been Others are scared. There's a fear because I mean a lot of Americans I think the statistic I last saw was only 20% of Americans have a passport So it is not very common for Americans to leave the United States period to like you know go on a Weekend trip or something. So there's a lot of apprehension around that. I don't know that anybody has had to put it Nobody has set like been hostile and said that you are leaving Because you've given up or something like that and clearly if things in America get better And if I can help them get better from afar, I would maybe go back someday, but at the moment, it's very difficult So it also depends on there's the difference between The idea of you leave in and the concept of just go into a different country and Who it is like if it is your mother or if it is your I don't know friends or something like that Versus a co-worker the co-worker is probably less likely to care They might think it's an interesting idea one thing I do recall is that Americans are very very good at complaining and The number of Americans that actually stop complaining and do something is very small So I have had some people say wow you actually did it. I didn't think you would so Maybe complaining as a universal trait. I don't know Have you ever known about people who are coming from Germany to the USA because there are some and Do you know why they want to do that? My guess the ones who I have known who have done that have come exclusively to get jobs in the Bay Area because they Pay a lot there are so many Barriers like I think the H1B visa and whatnot and plus you have to do a retinal scan and give a thumbprint and all that in order to enter the US which that's another rant altogether, but Usually it's almost entirely so actually there's two reasons it could be either economic like they want to make lots of money Or they have family here that they want to see so those are the two reasons that I have seen Because I mean basically you have to have a damn good reason Want to come to the US if you're not a US citizen because it's really hard to now and they don't make it very easy for you When you're here when you're in the US either There's one other thing I've seen where Germans and other Europeans and even Asians come to the United States and that it's much Easier to start your own company in the US. That's one thing that the US has that most of the rest of the world The government's getting the way of that so I was actually on the European Commission where they're asking a bunch of aliens like me and others About our perspectives on that so there are bureaucrats here that actually want to change that but there's a lot of History in the way of that at the moment If there are no more questions, that's fine because we are exactly in time and that's great Oh, thank you. I think we have to give a big. Thank you for this experience that you shared it with us And And if you see me an invisible friend walking around somewhere give him a glass of water