WEBVTT

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hey everybody welcome back to another episode

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of vision pros live i'm your host and coach fletcher

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ellingson and i'm so glad you're here i'm so

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glad that you are in this conversation today

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on the show we're going to be talking with author

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fred simpson fred welcome to the show thank you

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thank you fletcher glad to be here good good

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good and i'm glad you're here hey as i mentioned

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earlier we always like to start off with um well

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a win something that's going well professionally

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or personally, because there's a lot of uncertainty

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in the world. There's a lot of suffering going

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on in the world. I like to remind folks like,

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hey, we can take a moment and think of something

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that's going well. So, Fred, lay it on us. What's

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going well in your life? Well, actually, Fletcher,

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today, this morning, I had the final interview

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to go back and work and be a site manager on

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a power plant in In West Virginia. No kidding.

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That will kick off by the end of September. Well,

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congratulations. Which I've done 22 power plants

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in my career, and this will be number 23. So

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I build stuff very well. All right. Technical

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term. Well, if you're working on a power plant,

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they need people who can build well. So thank

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you for your service. Exactly. And, you know,

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I've done every kind of power plant you can think

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of, whatever fuels that have been used from wood

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chips to natural gas, to rice hulls, to garbage,

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to tires. I mean, you name it, I've used it and

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incorporated it as a fuel and a coal plant just

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a few years ago, the last big coal plant in southwest

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Virginia. But the other plus here is I'm also

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going to, with my book, Cyber Time, I'm going

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to have a book signing. the 13th of September

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and start some book signing in different areas.

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They've got a whole course of small bookstores

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and stuff around the U .S. that you can go to

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and just get meet and greet, get to know the

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people and sign books. And that'll be something

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new. Good for you. Because all of it is, and

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I found out, and what a surprise. I mean, I'm

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sitting here and I decide, well, I need to write

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a book and let everybody know what is out there

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as far as scams and hackers and everything. So

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I want to get this podcast to help sell it, market

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it, and also with the book signings and everything

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to get out there. I'm not looking to make a fortune.

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I want to get everybody to have tools and be

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forewarned on what is out there in social media

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and those platforms. So, you know, there is so

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much scamming going on. And so also with, you

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know, with the AI that's come around this last

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year. It is scary. It is really scary out there

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how many scams there are. If you can think it,

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they'll try to scam it. Yeah, that's part of

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the nature of the human being, right? It goes

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romance scams. Everybody wants to get something

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for a dozen, but romance scams, you've got, unfortunately

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now you've got crypto, you've got Bitcoin, you've

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got gold short trading. I mean, all those scams

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and those last three that I mentioned are the

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high dollar. Plus, I'm trying to get people invest

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in stocks and stuff. But those are the high dollar

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scams that they wrote people into. And well,

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you know, and I think you would agree with this,

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Fred, as long as human beings have been around,

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so has the scam. And, you know, a rule of thumb.

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And I think this is. For any age person, do not

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invest what you cannot afford to lose. Would

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you agree with that? I agree wholeheartedly.

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And there's another, take it another step further,

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Fletcher, is that if you have to think about

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it and wonder about it, then don't do it. I mean,

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if you're being pressured by greed. because it's

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something that you can get rich quick and it's

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then it's uh 99 times out of 100 it's going to

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be scam yeah hey uh fred how old are you i'm

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70 i'll be uh next week i'll be 71 in 71 years

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have you ever seen an actual get rich fast scheme

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i mean have you ever seen anything that's like

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yeah that will get actually get you rich quickly

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no why no Now, I even I even after I decided

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what the book and I lost some money, I lost some

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money up front. It was romance scam. It was none

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of this bitcoins or crypto or gold short. But

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I stayed on to get more information to figure

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it out and turned in, turn them into the FTC

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and turn them into FBI is the IC3. dot gov is

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a FBI or internet cyber division and turned them

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in. But they was gold short trading. That was

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the most involved one I ever saw. Yeah, it was

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so complicated that we had a whole platform to

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scan. So let me let me shift gears here a minute.

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You I'm going to kind of inform our audience.

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You were the victim of a scam. You did lose some

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money. So tell me what your vision is because

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you wrote a book called Cyber Time. So what's

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your vision? What do you want the audience to

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know? What is your vision, Fred? I want... Everyone

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to be forewarned is, and I've got in the book,

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I've got different actions and certain things

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that you can look at. There's 10 points to look

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at to tell whether somebody's real or not. If

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you're going to be on social media and the internet,

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you need to know how to identify them. And the

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biggest one, the biggest one with everybody is

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a video call. is to, you know, yeah, sure, you

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can say, well, they've got AI now, but AI cannot

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interact like we are right now, you know, and

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be able to talk back and forth and have subject

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matter that hasn't been rehearsed. And that is,

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I'd say, 95 % of it right there. But there's

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all sorts, there's nine other steps that you

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can take to identify. Now, what I've done is

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also in the book, is statistics on which platforms

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have how much is real and how much is scam. I've

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done my own statistics on it. And, you know,

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from Facebook to Instagram to Google Chat to

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Signal to Telegram to WhatsApp. I mean... and

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TikTok and the rest of them is just identify

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the percentage. Yeah. And let's get, I'm going

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to cut to the chase here because I want people

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to get your book, especially people who either

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have been scammed or are concerned about being

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scammed, but just some rules of thumb, right?

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Like number one, if somebody is asking you for

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money online, that's a red flag. Yes. Right.

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Yes. If somebody is if somebody is telling you

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a sob story or a hardship story, that's a red

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flag. All right. OK. So there are there are some

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real obvious ones that we need that are just

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like red flags. And in that conversation, you

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terminate and you block. Right. Yes. Yeah. The

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terms are called block and report. Block and

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report. Block and report. The report gets back

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to ones that monitor. There's certain social

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media that monitors. I mean, there's Facebook,

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Instagram, and some of the others somewhat. They

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monitor it. TikTok is actually one of the strictest

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platforms out there as far as any language. or

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turning in and reporting, they'll shut the other

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person off and get them off the social media

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platform. And that's what you want to do. Now,

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the biggest one you need to stay away from everybody,

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and I tell everybody this, is Zangi, Z -A -N

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-G -I. It's an amazing platform. I mean, you

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could actually... You could actually video call

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with about 1 ,000 people if you wanted at one

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time. And you can video call international, across

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the world, without a charge. It's all Wi -Fi.

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And it uses low band as far as that. But they

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do not have any of the servers to hold the information.

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So if you say, well, I want to block them, they

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can't. It's all on one device. One of your devices,

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if you try to put it on another one, like the

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rest of the platforms, like Facebook or anything,

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you could have it on a phone or your laptop.

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The rest of you, Zangie, you can't. Yeah. And

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it's commonly called the cheater's app, where

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a husband or wife and stuff like that or that.

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My stats say, that it's 73 % scammers on the

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site. Okay. There's 27 % that are real. And the

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best you can do is Facebook and Instagram is

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about 50 -50. Flipping a coin. Yeah, it is. Half

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of what you're going to talk to is going to try

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to scam you. Yeah. So, again, the rule of thumb

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is. Number one, don't get involved with money

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conversations. Don't give out vital information.

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You know, getting conversations with people,

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you know, if you suspect anything, block. But

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what I really want people to get here, Fred,

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is if they want to learn more, because you've

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obviously taken quite a bit of time and documented

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this. It looks like you got a big old thick book

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there. that you put a lot of time and effort

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into. How can people get this book? They can

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get it on Amazon .com. And Fletcher used to realize

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I did it with a pseudonym. I did it as Jameson

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Lyon. I used a nom de plume or whatever you want

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to call it. Because of the nature of the scamming

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and stuff as far as tracking. You know, is to

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is to go after it. But that's it's under both,

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you know, Jameson Lion as Cyber Time. And it's

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on Amazon dot com. It's on Barnes and Noble.

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It's on wherever you want to go. It's a Wal -Mart.

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And it's I mean, I'm talking all Amazon. There's

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15 Amazon sites and that's international and

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global. Yeah. I've got it on 84 different platforms.

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That's wonderful. Yeah. Hey, how long did it

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take you to write your book? I started in the

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end of May, June time frame and got to a point

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where it was published. You know, I was doing

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it with a Ghostwriters and a lump sum to get

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it written. And then with a publicist. And then

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there were two ghostwriters. That was kind of

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iffy. I ended up writing it half myself. But

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none of the book was written with AI. It is not

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with any generative AI. And, you know, it is

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really defined in the publisher world as far

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as whether it was done with AI or not. And then

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to get it published was done, actually, New Year's

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Day of this year was published. Oh, fun. Roughly

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about seven months, let's say. Yeah. What a great

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way to start the new year. Publish a book. I

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got the notice from Amazon or KDP, who does it

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for Amazon, on New Year's Day at 6 .23 p .m.

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Nice. That my book was on. But I got, it's on,

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it's paperback, hardcover, and e -book. I have

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not done an audible yet. audible okay good good

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well we're coming up towards the uh the last

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couple uh minutes here anything else you want

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us to know here before we we sign off i would

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just like to pass on to people that there are

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other uh areas out there that you get information

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and and i've i've touched bases with a lot of

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them your state uh attorney general office You

00:14:50.720 --> 00:14:54.159
can talk to them, your state insurance investigation

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division. And Iowa has, I went to a couple of

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presentations by the people, and they had very

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good pointers, you know, because you've got all

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these other scams. I mean, you're talking about

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telephone. You're talking about, you know, in

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the mail. You've got people coming personally

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to try to scam you. And there's different ways.

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I'll just say one of them that really. enlightened

00:15:19.679 --> 00:15:24.659
me is that you know when they uh they try to

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sell you to keep from someone stealing your house

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and your mortgage these four people that give

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the presentation they had never seen it done

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in their career it's a scam by the companies

00:15:41.779 --> 00:15:44.789
that are putting this on to get your money And

00:15:44.789 --> 00:15:46.950
they can only do anything if something's been

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done. And they didn't know of anybody that has.

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There's too many things involved. There's a clerk

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and recorder. There's insurance. I mean, all

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this stuff that has to go in place, nobody's

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going to get that information, do a quick claim

00:15:59.450 --> 00:16:04.490
on your property. And the other one quickly is

00:16:04.490 --> 00:16:10.490
to stop your, you know, you've got your three

00:16:10.490 --> 00:16:16.210
credit rate. companies. The credit bureaus have

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all your information. You can stop them. OK.

00:16:21.009 --> 00:16:24.629
But it's that you can freeze that credit. And

00:16:24.629 --> 00:16:27.690
and keep anybody from accessing your information.

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And if you need. Right. Yeah. You can freeze

00:16:31.830 --> 00:16:35.110
those. Put a freeze on your credit. Unfreeze

00:16:35.110 --> 00:16:38.529
it when you need to access it. Yeah. Right. Yeah.

00:16:38.649 --> 00:16:42.470
So good stuff. Hey. Yeah. So. If you're interested

00:16:42.470 --> 00:16:43.889
in learning how to protect yourself, learning

00:16:43.889 --> 00:16:47.789
how to identify scams and how to take action

00:16:47.789 --> 00:16:51.509
in the face of those, pick up a copy of Fred's

00:16:51.509 --> 00:16:56.610
book. It's called Cyber Time. Get it at Walmart

00:16:56.610 --> 00:16:59.970
.com. Get it at Amazon .com. And if you want

00:16:59.970 --> 00:17:03.909
to connect with Fred, look him up on LinkedIn

00:17:03.909 --> 00:17:09.069
and connect with him. Or Facebook. I'm on Facebook

00:17:09.069 --> 00:17:13.490
or Instagram, too. Right on. Fred, thanks so

00:17:13.490 --> 00:17:16.470
much for your time. Thanks for all the work you've

00:17:16.470 --> 00:17:19.769
been doing on those power plants, keeping the

00:17:19.769 --> 00:17:23.269
lights on for our country. And I wish you all

00:17:23.269 --> 00:17:27.509
the best as you go on, continue to do that. And

00:17:27.509 --> 00:17:29.750
as you travel around and promote your book as

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well. Thanks for being on the show. Thank you,

00:17:32.269 --> 00:17:34.829
Fletcher. You're welcome. And now you know what

00:17:34.829 --> 00:17:36.269
it's time to do. It's time to get out there.

00:17:36.640 --> 00:17:38.859
Be a source of kindness. Be a source of contribution.

00:17:39.299 --> 00:17:42.039
You do have something to offer this world, and

00:17:42.039 --> 00:17:43.880
I believe in you. Thank you for being here today.

00:17:44.059 --> 00:17:45.819
I'm really happy that you tuned in to Vision

00:17:45.819 --> 00:17:48.440
Pros Live. I'm looking forward to seeing your

00:17:48.440 --> 00:17:51.240
reactions as these episodes continue to move

00:17:51.240 --> 00:17:53.180
forward. This is going to get more and more fun.

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We'll have more and more engagement as well.

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We'll invite people to participate in the show.

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And thank you for giving us your time and attention.

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Have an excellent time building out your vision

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and becoming a vision pro yourself.