energy available and green house gases. The European Union, France, Germany, Japan, Italy, and the presence of leaders from Mauritius and the World Bank. The IAEM ECMOU signed today will accelerate investments to scale high quality infrastructure and the development of economic corridors through the partnership for global infrastructure and investment. Excellencies, I would now invite the leaders to make their remarks. First, we will have the Honourable Prime Minister of India with his remarks. Your Highnesses. Excellencies, I welcome you all to this special event. My friend, President Biden, I am very happy to be able to share this event with you. Today we all have seen an important and historic meeting. In the coming times, India, West Asia and Europe will have an impact on economic integration. This whole world will provide connectivity and development with sustainable development. My Excellency, President Biden, His Royal Highness Crown Prince and Prime Minister Mohammed bin Salman, His Royal Highness Ratapati Sheikh Mohammed bin Jaid, His Excellency Ratapati Macro, His Excellency Chancellor Scholz, Her Excellency President Maloney, and Her Excellency President Bondair Lyon. I give a lot of applause for all of these initiatives. Strong connectivity and infrastructure is the foundation of the development of human resources. India has given this issue to the public in its development journey. Along with the physical infrastructure, it is also investing in the social, digital and financial infrastructure. We are building a strong bond between India and the rest of the world. We have implemented infrastructure projects in areas such as the global south, such as energy, railways, water, technology parks and infrastructure projects. In these efforts, we have given special strength to demand-driven and transparent approaches. Through PGII, it is important to reduce the infrastructure gap in the countries of the global south. Friends, India's connectivity is not limited to the region. Connectivity with all areas is the main priority of India. We believe that connectivity is a source of both business and trust in different countries. It is important to promote connectivity initiatives. Such as infrastructure norms, rules and laws, the respect of all countries, increasing the financial viability rather than increasing the date burden. It is important to follow all the guidelines of the development. When we are taking such a big initiative of connectivity, we are talking about the future generations' dreams and dreams. I would like to thank all the leaders on this historical occasion. Thank you, sir. India and the United States of America co-chair this initiative. And now, as the co-chair, I invite the President of the United States for his remarks. Well, ladies and gentlemen, thank you. All my colleagues, this is someone once said in a similar domestic action that was positive. This is a big deal. This is a real big deal. I want to thank you, Mr. Prime Minister. One Earth, one family, one future. That is the focus of this G20 summit. And in many ways, it is also the focus of this partnership that we are talking about today. Building sustainable, resilient infrastructure, making quality infrastructure investments, and creating a better future. A future that presents greater opportunity, dignity, and prosperity for everyone. Last year, we came together as one to commit to this vision. And this afternoon, I want to highlight the key ways in which the United States and our partners are working to make this a reality. Economic corridors. You can hear that phrase more than once. I expect over the next decade. Economic corridors. As you work to address infrastructure gaps across low-middle-income countries, we need to maximize the impact of our investments. That's why a few months ago, I announced that the United States will work with our partners to invest in economic corridors. In practice, it means we're focusing on regional infrastructure projects that deliver results across multiple countries and in multiple sectors. And today, I'm proud to announce that we finalized historic agreement for a new India, Middle East, Europe economic corridor. As a key part of this corridor, we're going to invest in ships and rail that extends from India all the way to Europe, connected by the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and Israel. Bridging ports across two continents, unlocking endless opportunities, including making it far easier to trade, export clean energy, expand access to reliable clean electricity, lay cables that will connect communities and secure a stable internet, contributing to a more stable, more prosperous and integrated Middle East. And I want to thank the sponsors. And I particularly want to thank Prime Minister Modi and the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, Mohammed bin Salam, excuse me, Mohammed bin Salam and President von der Leyen and the European Commissions. And since he's not speaking today, I wanted to, maybe he is speaking today. I had no idea he was speaking at any rate. I'm going to stop there. In Saudi, the sub-Saharan Africa, we're working in a private public partnership as well to invest in a trans-African corridor. That includes a new partner, the European Union. President von der Leyen, thank you for making this very possible. Together as part of this corridor, we're going to invest in a new rail line that will extend from the western port of Angola to the DRC, to Zambia and ultimately the Indian Ocean. It's a project that's about far from just laying tracks. It's about creating jobs, increasing trade, strengthening supply chains, boosting connectivity, laying foundations that will strengthen commerce and food security for people across multiple countries. This is a game-changing regional investment and both of these are huge, huge steps forward. But they're far from the only ones. We're continuing to make big investments in infrastructure around the world. That includes a solar energy site and some manufacturing facility and electricity project right here in India. We're continuing to develop economic corridors across Africa, Asia and America. And together with our partners, we're working to mobilize the trillions of investment needed to close infrastructure gaps around the world including the formation of a new investor forum that the United States will host in a couple of weeks. Let me close with this. The world stands at an inflection point in history. A point where decisions we make today are going to affect the course of our future, all of our futures for decades to come. A point where our investments are more critical than ever. So together, let's continue to work as one to seize this moment in history and maximize our collective investments. To find new partners, to unlock new capital. Because when we invest in low- and middle-income countries, all countries benefit. When we invest in emerging economies, all economies benefit. And when we invest in the future of people anywhere, people everywhere benefit. So I want to thank you again for being here. I look forward to working with all of you and I'm going to turn it back to the Prime Minister. Thank you. Thank you, Excellency. We now invite the Crown Prince and the Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia for his remarks. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. In conclusion, I'd like to commend the PGII launched by President Biden with the participation of Saudi Arabia in $20 billion. We look forward to the integration of the Initiative and the Economic Corridor Project, which is announced in this meeting. I would like to thank those who worked with us to reach this founding step to establish this important economic corridor. My best regard to you all. Thank you, Your Highness. May I now invite the President of the European Commission for her remarks, please? Your Highnesses, Excellencies. It's been two years since we launched PGII, a joint vision by the world's leading economies, to invest in the infrastructure that low- and middle-income countries need. And two years on, more large-scale projects are seeing the light, and we are presenting two of them today. First, the India-Middle East Europe Economic Corridor. This is nothing but historic. It will be the most direct connection to date between India, the Arabian Gulf, and Europe, with a rail link that will make trade between India and Europe 40% faster, with an electricity cable and a clean hydrogen pipeline to foster clean energy trade between Asia, the Middle East, and Europe, with a high-speed data cable to link some of the most innovative digital ecosystems in the world and create business opportunities all along the way. These are state-of-the-art connections for the world of tomorrow, faster, shorter, cleaner. This corridor is much more than just a railway or a cable. It is a green and digital bridge across continents and civilizations. And this is also the spirit of the second project we announced today, the Trans-African Corridor, which will connect the Port of Lobito in Angola with the Katanga Province in DRC, and the Copper Belt in Zambia. Our goal is not only to connect a landlocked region to the sea. Our partnership will also invest in local value chains, in clean energy, and in skills for the local workforce. This is the spirit of PGII. It is a whole new approach to large infrastructure investment. It is about shared prosperity. It is about real benefits for all partners. Thank you. Thank you, Excellency. May I now invite the President of France for his remarks, please? Thank you so much. Everything was said. I just want to thank Prime Minister Modi for organizing this meeting and President Biden for sharing this meeting with him. We are committed, and we had several exchanges with my friends, Mohammed bin Zayed, and I want to thank you, Your Highness, and Mohammed bin Salman and Narendra Modi on this very important project. Everything was said.  This is a very important project from Asia through Middle East to Europe to offer big opportunities and connect people. Our intention is as well to make it real and to be sure that after this commitment we have concrete results. Especially to have the first global green trade road, meaning having net zero transport infrastructure, so to be sure that we have the best technologies. We have hydrogen being part of this project and we channel all the possible common developments. I think as well our intention is to have a fair process. I mean offering a lot of opportunities to manufacture in the different countries and to cooperate very actively on building these roads, building the innovations going with it and innovating together. I don't want to be longer. Thank you very much for this. This ceremony is very important. We commit together. Thank you, Excellency. May I now invite the Chancellor of Germany for his remarks, please. Thank you and especially thank you Narendra and Joe for convening this event here. I think it is very important to remember that we launched the partnership for global infrastructure and investment last year. And since then, PGII contributes to closing the global investment gap for quality infrastructure. As Emmanuel Macron already said most about this initiative and all the activities we speak about today are already, is already set. So I will not repeat it, just mentioning two questions. The first is we have to be active that these things can happen and this is for me that we then have to also work on the infrastructure, the institutions that can work on financing. And for this I think it is also important to make the work of the World Bank successful. Germany will contribute an additional 305 million Euro of hybrid capital to the World Bank and this is one of the aspects which is a side of the activity here. We also try to work with Africa and the Compact with Africa will convene in Berlin in November also as a sign of creating infrastructure, developing economy, all the things we all together here. Thank you, Excellency. May I now invite the Prime Minister of Japan for his remarks please. Thank you very much. I welcome the holding of this side event on partnership for global infrastructure and investment. On the occasion of the G7 Hiroshima Summit in May this year, as the G7 Chair, Japan hosted a PGI meeting inviting private businesses for the first time, which was attended by leaders of G7 and partner countries. Japan is delivering various transport infrastructure development projects, including the construction of daily metro here in the city to support economic development of partner countries. Going forward, we want to take this effort a step further to expand the scope of cooperation to wider areas including supply chains to link people together by strengthening connectivity. We also intend to work on building industrial value chains in the whole of Bay of Bengal. The Road Network Connectivity Improvement Plan and other northeastern regional development initiatives in India will be organically linked with the Bay of Bengal Industrial Growth Belt Initiative or a big B that we are working on with Bangladesh. Furthermore, the Japan-ASEAN Comprehensive Connectivity Initiative that Japan announced at the ASEAN-related summit meeting will strengthen connectivity in a variety of areas including transport infrastructure, digital connectivity, maritime cooperation, supply chains, electricity as well as human and knowledge connectivity. In this way, Japan will continue to lead the effort for tangible implementation of PGII. To do that, partnership with diverse actors who subscribe to its principles is essential. For the promotion of PGII, I call on everyone gathered here once again to work together. Thank you very much. Thank you, Excellency. May I now invite the Prime Minister of Italy for her remarks. Your Highnesses, Excellencies, when we launched the partnership for global infrastructure and investment just over a year ago, we committed to building better infrastructure for better future in low- and middle-income nations. We committed to cooperate with these nations with an equal, non-predatory approach to create new opportunities and prosperity. Today's launch of the new economic corridor between India and Middle Eastern Europe goes precisely in this direction and is a milestone in strengthening global interconnections. And that is why I want to thank Prime Minister Modi, President Biden and all the others, Ursula von der Leyen and all the others who made it possible for its very important thing. And this will scale up our economy's growth, opening enormous potential for mutual benefits in the business sector. Obviously, Italy is ready to play a decisive role in this process. Also, through the unique expertise of Italian companies in the maritime and railway sector. And we want to contribute in building bridges between the Mediterranean and the Indo-Pacific, also in the fields of energy and digital connectivity via Africa and the Arabian Gulf. In the energy sector, we can work in different fields including the production and transport of green hydrogen from the Middle East to the Mediterranean. We also support the European Commission on the Elmet Project, a high-voltage submarine electricity interconnection that will link Italy to Tunisia. We are working to strengthen digital connections critical for innovation and growth between the wider Mediterranean and Asia, Lurama. Raman, named after India's Nobel laureate in physics, Raman, will connect Europe with India and involves major companies such as Google and Tim Sparkle. However, we also are aware that there is still too much to be done to narrow the infrastructure gap with low and middle income nations. And this is why we will continue work on the partnership for global infrastructure and investment during the Italian G7 presidency next year. Thank you. Thank you, everybody. Thank you, Excellency. Thank you, Your Highnesses and Your Excellencies, for launching the landmark India Middle East Europe Economic Corridor. I would request all media and officials to remain seated and standing in their places while the leaders depart. Excuse me for interrupting, but as we say, my body used to work a point of personal privilege. I did not mention the Sheikh Mohammed of the UAE because I knew he wasn't speaking, but I do want to say thank you, thank you, thank you. I don't think we'd be here without you. Thank you. Thank you, Your Highnesses and Excellencies. I would request all media to remain seated and standing in their positions while the leaders leave the room. Thank you.


Oh, hi.  Speaking of decorating trees, let's have a review of a G.I. Joe toy that was voted on by patrons. Christmas! Christmas is in the air! Christmas is about my favorite holiday, know what I mean? And for this review on Patreon, we held the most epic poll of the entire year. More options than any other poll in 2018, and the patrons got to choose what we would see this week, and in keeping with the Christmas spirit, they chose Airtite. They didn't even go for the Pogo Ballistic Battle Ball, which kind of looks like a Christmas ornament. No, they wanted Airtite and Airtite they are going to get. And for this special video, we have the Airtite fan club with us today. Let's hear some noise from the Airtite fan club. In fact, Airtite does have a fan. I would like to dedicate this review to Phil. Phil works for a judge in a courtroom where I used to have cases, and Airtite was his favorite figure. And bless me if I can think of anyone else for whom Airtite is their favorite figure. So Phil, this one's for you. I can think of absolutely nothing else to say to introduce this review. So, HCC 788 presents the review chosen by patrons from 1985, Airtite. This is Airtite, GI Joe's hostile environment trooper from 1985. This figure was first available in 1985 and was also available in 1986 and was discontinued for the year 1987. This is the only version of Airtite in the vintage era, which is a little surprising. There were opportunities to bring Airtite back, but none of those opportunities were taken. Airtite was released in 1985 and 1985 is considered the golden age of 1980s GI Joe. A lot of collectors consider 1985 to be the best year of the vintage era. A lot of popular figures were released that year, a lot of great vehicles. It's hard to beat 1985 for influential characters. Airtite is one of the most forgotten figures of 1985. Amid all that greatness, Airtite often gets overlooked. 1985 has an all-star lineup, but do you count Airtite as a star? One reason Airtite may be forgotten, though it's not necessarily the only reason, is his specialty kind of leaves him as the odd man out. It's not necessarily a combat role. Some fans may have had a hard time figuring out what to do with Airtite. In fact, I know some fans who liked Airtite, but they found different roles for him. Airtite didn't even have a specific Cobra threat to counter. He didn't get a real Cobra opponent until the Toxoviper in 1988 and by that time the Airtite figure was no longer on the pegs. Given that Airtite may not go on a lot of missions, I know a lot of collectors use him in a support role, driving support vehicles. I think he looks great with the refueling trailer on the 1985 USS Flag Aircraft Carrier playset. The colors match almost perfectly. It's like he was made for it. You could also use him as a pilot, and I believe that's the way Phil, the person to whom this video is dedicated, used his Airtite figure. Even though Airtite had a hard time finding his place in 1980s G.I. Joe, in the 1990s G.I. Joe took a turn in Airtite's direction. It could have led to a revival of Airtite, but it didn't. In 1991 G.I. Joe got a new sub-faction, the Eco Warriors. They fought against ecological threats such as toxic pollutants, and they were decked out in hazmat suits. It was essentially a whole team of Airtites, but it did not include Airtite. This despite the fact that Eco Warriors did include one of Airtite's 1985 teammates, Flint, who had no prior experience with this specialty. In 1992, Eco Warriors got a second wave, which included updated versions of Barbecue and Deep Six. Barbecue was another one of Airtite's 1985 teammates. Eco Warriors went to the 1985 well twice, but bypassed Airtite. I think that is a tragic missed opportunity. I believe 1991 Eco Warriors clean sweep could easily have been made into Airtite version 2. You wouldn't even have to change the figure, just say Airtite grew a mustache. Done. Here, Airtite would finally have had some worthy opponents with cesspool and his minions, but of course Airtite was long gone by then. If you were lucky enough to have an Airtite figure when the Eco Warriors came out, I'd say it would have been a good idea to just make him an Eco Warrior. He looks pretty good next to those Eco Warriors color schemes. In fact, he looks better than a lot of them. Let's take a look at Airtite's accessories by starting with this thing that he is holding that looks like a weapon but probably isn't. The contents of the card on which Airtite was packaged call this a sniffer. That's right, a sniffer. It has a downturn nozzle in the front that looks like a vacuum cleaner. It has a knob in the back for the black hose that connects it to the backpack. It has a grip and it has a foregrip. The grip fits in the figure's hand fine, but the foregrip is a little thick and I would not try to force that into the figure's hand. You would risk breaking the thumb. So as a sniffer, what exactly does this do? I think it is used in concert with the backpack to detect toxins in the air. The card art for Airtite shows this weapon with a buttstock and a strap. It really looks more like a weapon. So maybe this accessory started out as a weapon but they altered it. The packaging is very nonspecific about what this is supposed to do. If you had Airtite as a kid, what did you imagine this thing did? This knob in the back connects to a length of standard black GI Joe hose. That runs to the backpack. It's easy to pop it out of the sniffer. Then it connects to the backpack on this knob here on the bottom. It's a short length of black flexible GI Joe hose. This came with a lot of figures. Nothing really specific to Airtite here. Airtite has another hose. It connects to the back of his helmet in two places and it runs to the backpack and this I think is really cool and unique. This looks like two hoses but it's really just one. You can remove it from the helmet by just pulling it out of the holes in the back of the helmet and then it is wedged into this notch in the backpack so you can pull it out and you can actually see what the hose looks like. This is a molded hose with ridges and I think this is really cool. It's made out of black flexible plastic. Now this is an accessory that a lot of collectors might just skip. It's like a lot of other hoses and microphones on other figures. It can tend to go missing fairly easily but this is not an accessory that I would skip on Airtite because I think he looks just too cool with it on. Finally we get to Airtite's backpack. The card contents call it a compressor backpack. It is olive green. It has a knob here on the bottom for the hose that connects to the sniffer. It has a notch here on the top for the hose that connects to the helmet. It has some molded on technical detail. It has a couple fans on it. I'm not sure what it means by compressor backpack. Does it blow compressed air out of the gun? Based on the way the backpack interacts with the figure, I'd say it has two functions. Since it connects to the helmet, I think it provides clean air to the helmet. And since it connects to the sniffer, I'd say it works with the sniffer to detect toxic gases. Let's take a look at Airtite's articulation. He had the articulation that was standard for GI Joe figures starting in 1985. He had the new ball-jointed head so he could turn his head from left to right and look up and down. He could swing his arm up at the shoulder and swivel at the shoulder all the way around. He had a hinge at the elbow so he could move his arm at the elbow about 90 degrees. He had a swivel at the bicep that allowed him to swivel his arm all the way around. The figure was held together with a rubber O-ring that looped around the inside. That allowed him to move at the torso a bit. He could move his legs apart about so far. He could bend his leg at the hip about 90 degrees and bend at the knee about 90 degrees. Let's take a look at the sculpt design and color of Airtite starting with his head and on his head he has a green and black non-removable helmet.  It has a black face mask and it's open at the eyes. We can see his eyes but I think it's implied he's wearing goggles. He's completely protected from a toxic environment so he would want to protect his eyes as well. This helmet looks pretty good. I can't deny that. I do prefer removable helmets but I do understand why some helmets were made non-removable. For one thing, when you have a non-removable helmet the figure is less versatile. He is locked into a roll where he would wear a helmet. But when you have a non-removable helmet you get to do things like connect it to the backpack. It is a trade-off but I do still prefer removable helmets for Joes. I like to see their faces. The creators of both the GI Jo animated series and the comic books series realized the problem and they showed Airtite without his helmet. This does humanize the character a bit. It allows us to relate to the character a bit more but it also shows scenarios that cannot be replicated with the toy. Moving on to his chest, Airtite is wearing a yellow jumpsuit and this is a very bright color for a soldier to be wearing. It's not quite the bright neon yellow of Clean Sweep's hazmat suit. It's a deeper, richer yellow. Over that he is wearing an olive green vest. We can see that in front and back and he has a black device on his chest that has a hose that runs down under his right arm and it looks like that's supposed to connect to the backpack as well. So whatever this device on the chest is it's another piece of electronic equipment that is connected to his backpack. From the sniffer to the helmet to the device on the figure's chest that backpack is doing triple duty. The arms are yellow. It's the long sleeves from the yellow jumpsuit. They're kind of tied and bunched up at the upper arms. Then he has long green gloves that have kind of ridged details on them. On his waist piece he has an olive green belt that is quite plain. No pouches, no other paint colors on it. On his legs he has a continuation of that yellow jumpsuit. He has a pocket on each thigh and he has olive green boots. All right, let's address the elephant in the room. Airtite is yellow. Based on his specialty this is probably supposed to be a hazmat suit. The same as with clean sweep and hazmat suits are often issued in bright colors. As we will see when we look at Airtite's file card his MOS is CBR or chemical biological and radiological. More commonly known as CBRN and CBRN troops did sometimes wear hazmat suits in yellow. So I can't say this is unrealistic. What is unrealistic is sending Airtite into a combat environment wearing yellow.  That brings us right back to the trouble of finding a role for Airtite. He is not equipped to go with your other Joes on their combat missions. And if you were anything like me as a kid most of your playtime was taken up with combat missions. So what are you supposed to do with them? Let's take a look at Airtite's file card. His file card has his faction as GI Joe. It has a portrait of Airtite here and I think that is really good. The artwork in 1985 even for mediocre characters was excellent. His specialty is hostile environment. It doesn't say hostile environment trooper or hostile environment soldier just hostile environment. Codename Airtite. His filename is Kurt Schnurr and I thought this name was peculiar. I figured there had to be some reason behind it. I looked it up and the family name Schnurr has the meaning of jester or prankster and that fits Airtite's personality. Primary military specialty is CBR or chemical biological and radiological warfare. This would more properly be CBRN or chemical biological radiological and nuclear. CBRN was a cold war term that was replaced after the cold war by NBC or nuclear biological chemical. CBRN in its term replaced the term ABC or atomic biological chemical. The term used back in the 1950s. Secondary military specialty ordinance place of birth New Haven Connecticut grade is E4. This top paragraph says Kurt was the kid who could hold his breath the longest. He was also the kid who had the largest collection of plastic dinosaurs on the block. He was a weird kid who grew up to be an even stranger adult. It takes a mighty weird person to walk into a cloud of toxic gas strong enough to fell a mutant weight lifter cockroach wearing a protective suit built under contract for the government by the lowest bidder. So wait is the mutant weight lifter cockroach wearing the protective suit? This bottom paragraph has a quote. It says Airtite is an unreformed practical joker. Sneezing powder, plastic barf, whoopee cushion the whole bit. No prank is too low for him. You'd think the other joes would hate his guts, but they don't. When the bad guys escalate the firefight and start playing dirty, it's old Airtite who suits up and wades into the thick of it. The first paragraph depicts Airtite as being a geek, and he was a geek before being a geek was cool. The second paragraph depicts him as being a prankster, which is the source of the name Schnur. For these reviews, I like to Google the character name just to see if there's any reference for the character out there somewhere that I don't know about. So pardon me if I do a quick Google on Airtite. Oh, and it looks like Airtite is slang for something. It's slang for whoa. Do not Google Airtite. Do not Google Airtite. Looking at how Airtite was used in G.I. Joe Media, he first appeared in the animated series in Pyramid of Darkness Part 2, but he got a little more screen time in Part 3. He got the most exposure in the episode titled The Germ. It was kind of a weird sci-fi story, but it showed some intrigue and conflict within Cobra, which is good. There was some good characterization for Airtite, and he appeared with no helmet for most of the episode. In the comic book series published by Marvel Comics, he first appeared in issue number 44, along with some other 1985 Joes. He had his helmet off most of the time, and he had a similar look to how he appeared in the animated series, but his hair was messier. In that issue, he is pivotal in defeating Dr. Mindbender's plan. He appears again in issue number 54, doing clerk duties when the G.I. Joe team was operating out of a temporary headquarters. He suggests a secret mission to Hawk, and Hawk runs with the idea. Airtite is not seen again in the main G.I. Joe series until issue number 130. In that issue, Cobra invades yet another G.I. Joe secret base. He's shown working with Ecowarrior's barbecue. Even the comic book series thought Airtite should be with Ecowarrior's. Airtite was a background character for the most part. His opportunities to shine did not come from the main G.I. Joe series, but from the special missions series. In special missions number two, he goes on a mission to neutralize poison gas in a World War II German bomber that's frozen in a glacier. I think this is his best moment. He's really well used in that issue. Oddly though, his hair is miscolored blonde, and all of his other appearances he has brown hair. In special missions number 21, he actually makes the cover. He's with a team of Joes investigating poison gas in a New York sewer. Looking at Airtite overall, for me, this is a middle tier figure. There's nothing especially wrong with the figure, but there's nothing especially spectacular about it either. And considering the fact that it's from 1985, the Golden Age, a middle tier figure is a bit lackluster. Considering the class that he is in, more is expected. You might expect me to not like the yellow uniform. And you would be right. Back in 1985, I didn't like the yellow uniform. And in 2018, I don't like the yellow uniform. But it could be worse. It's still better than Clean Sweep. In fact, if you set this figure next to Clean Sweep, looks pretty good in comparison. He has a non-removable helmet, and I understand why they did it. I understand the trade-offs. But my preference is still for removable helmets on Jo figures. I understand the yellow uniform is a hazmat suit, so it's supposed to be yellow. So it is realistic in that sense. But if you see Airtite's uniform as a hazmat suit, it limits his role and restricts what he can do on the team.  If Cobra uses poison gas in the jungle, the Joes are just SOL because they didn't have a hazard environment trooper that was properly camouflaged. On the other hand, if you don't view Airtite's uniform as a hazmat suit, he could do other things. And that's my understanding of how Phil used his figure. If you got this figure and it didn't have any of the accessories, it didn't have the file card, you had no idea about the character's background or his specialty. What does this figure look like? Kind of looks like a pilot. You could put Airtite in a jet, in a helicopter. He would look just fine. You can also have Airtite driving support vehicles. His color scheme actually works very well for that. I know some collectors use the figure that way. I do appreciate that in G.I. Joe, not every character was a frontline combat troop. Some characters fulfilled support roles and that's good. That gives the line some depth. However, if those support roles did not factor into your playtime very much, you might have had a hard time figuring out what to do with Airtite. Airtite is not my favorite figure by a long stretch. I think some of the figure is a bit plain. It has some drawbacks, but it has enough going for it that I feel comfortable putting it in the middle tier. That was my review of Airtite. I hope you enjoyed it. Phil, I hope you liked the review. Airtite Fan Club, what did you think? Those wild and crazy guys. Hey, Airtite Fan Club? New band name. Just a quick update on my schedule for December. Next week we will have another review and it will be a special review and it will be the last review of the year. I will be taking Sunday, December 23rd off for the Christmas holiday. After that, we will be doing our annual question and answer video. So the last video of the year will be the answers video for the Q&A. Watch for the Q&A announcement video. It will be coming soon. I want to thank everyone who is watching this video and wish all of you a happy holidays. Thank you to everyone who has stuck with me on this channel for all of these years. We've had a few Christmases together and it's my privilege to share the season with you and share some GI Joe nostalgia. Thank you to my patrons who make this channel possible. You guys, you guys chose Airtite. You guys, I love you. As always, I ask you to like this video, subscribe to the YouTube channel and share this video. That's what helps this channel grow. You can find me on social media on Facebook and Twitter and you can support the channel on Patreon and coffee. If you support the channel on Patreon, you will get to vote in these polls to choose some of the reviews that we do. With support at some levels, you even get a secret code book so you can read the message you're seeing on the screen right now. I hope your family has a wonderful holiday season and keep in mind that not everyone has a family to celebrate the holiday with. So, if your family has a wonderful holiday and has more than enough, maybe consider sharing some of it with somebody who doesn't. And if you're one of the folks for whom the holidays is not a joyous happy time, well, I'll be thinking of you and you'll always have a home here. Thanks everyone for watching. I'll see you next week with a vintage GI Joe toy review. And until then, remember, only GI Joe is GI Joe.


and today I'm actually at my lazy voice store getting ready to design my family room for my new home little did I know what they really do offer from couches to sectionals to dining rooms to bedrooms they cover it all and it's all customized exactly what you need so I'm excited to show you what I'm gonna do for my home let's get started


Hi, my name is Sebastia Matteau and today I would like to show you seven simple tricks that you can use to make your Python code easier to read, simpler and just in general more beautiful. All of these are solutions to very simple but common problems that you encounter while writing Python code and that people tend to solve in suboptimal ways.  I will do this in Python 3.4, but all the tips and tricks are equally applicable to Python 2.7 or whatever kind of version of Python that is currently used by most people. Let's start with the first trick. This is a very common scenario in which we have a list, in this case a list of cities, and we want to walk through this list, this list of cities, while printing them out for example to the terminal and also printing out their position in the list. So we want to get all the items from the list and their positions. A very common but bad way to solve this problem is to create a counter variable, i, which starts out at zero because the first position in the list is position zero, not position one, but zero. And then we walk through all cities in the list, so for city in cities, we print out the counter variable and the name of the city and then we increment counter variable by one. Now if I select this and execute it, you see here in the terminal that this works, right? So it prints out zero, Marseille, Marseille is the first city in the list, Amsterdam is the second one, New York is the third one and London is the fourth one, so it works. But it is bad because we create, it's quite difficult, moderately difficult to grasp the logic at first sight and we create this counter variable that we don't really need. So let's take a look at the good way, the phytonic way to do this and that is using the enumerate function. So what we can do is instead of walking directly through the list of cities, we can pass the list of cities to enumerate and enumerate returns a list of indices and city names, right? So basically enumerate first returns is 0, Marseille then it returns 1, Amsterdam then returns 2, New York and then it returns 3, London. And if I select this and I execute it, you see here in the debug window that it works, it does exactly the same thing as the bad way but it is easier to read and it avoids two lines and it also avoids this temporary counter variable. So the bottom line is that whenever you have a list and you want to walk through this list and at the same time keep track of the positions in this list, you should usually use enumerate and not create a kind of a counter variable as you see here in the bad way. Now let's move on to scenario or tip number 2 which again has to do with lists and the scenario is the following. Say that we have two lists for example a list of x coordinates and a list of y coordinates and we want to walk through these two lists at the same time for example to print, for example to draw a dot at these coordinates, right? So we want to first get the first x-coordinate and first y-coordinate then next time get the second x-coordinate, the second y-coordinate and then get the third x-coordinate and the third y-coordinate, right? So instead of first looping through the x-list and then looping through the y-list, we want to loop through both lists at the same time. Now this is quite a common problem and I think you'll usually see it solved in this kind of awkward way that you see here. So what you can do first is get the length of x-list which is three right because there are three items then we create a range from zero through the length to the length of this list so we get the basically zero comma one comma two and then we loop through that right so it is basically four i in zero comma one comma two that's what it says here even though it's quite difficult to read. Then we get the x-coordinate at the position that we currently at right so we get the first time we get one, the second time we get two, third time we get three. We do the same for the y-coordinate so the first time we get two and four and six and then we print them out. Now if I select this and run it then you see here in the in the terminal you see that it works right so the first x and y tuple basically that we print out is one and two then we print out two and four so two and four then we print print out three and six so three and six so that's what we want to do but it is very difficult to read right especially this range length x-list thing is quite quite horrible. So the good way to do this in Python is to make use of the zip function so what we can do is for x y in zip x-list y-list and then we print x y so what zip does is it takes two or more lists and it really zips them together so basically pairs creates tuples that pair items at the same positions in all of these lists right so it pairs one with two it pairs two with four and it pairs three with six and then basically you can say okay walk through each of these pairs so the first time is x is one y is two the second time x is two y is four etc and then we can print it out so if i select this and i run it you see that it does exactly the same thing as before right the only thing is that it is shorter we have saved two lines of codes and it is much more readable right so the bottom line is that whenever you have two or more lists and you want to walk through these lists at the same time you probably want to use zip instead of devising a kind of an awkward ugly range construction that you see below now let's move on to scenario number three which again is a very common scenario and it is the following say the way you have two variables x and y and we want to swap their values so we start out with x being 10 and y being minus 10 but we want to swap this so that x becomes minus 10 and y becomes 10 then what you usually do is you use this kind of or what most people do is use this kind of temporary variable so we assign the value of y to temp then we assign the value of x to y then we assign the value of temp to x and then we've done the swap right so we need this temporary variable to make sure that we don't lose one of the values in the in the during the swapping now if i select this and i run it you see that it works right before x is 10 and y is minus 10 and afterwards x is minus 10 and y is 10 so it works but it's bad because it is we have the swap took us three lines and it is uh uh and we also needed to create this temporary swapping value variable so the good way says follows comment out that way up the good way is simply do this x y is y comma x and we can do the whole swap in one line and this is a trick that is very peculiar very particular to python and it is really cool it's called tuple unpacking so what we do first we create a tuple so a pair of values first the y coordinate and then the x coordinate and we unpack it to the left hand side so basically it means y gets assigned to x and x gets assigned to y and because this whole line whole line happens at one at the same time right it happens instantaneously in a sense uh we don't need this this this temporary uh swapping variable temp that we needed before right because we don't lose we don't lose any of the values in the swapping process now if i take this and i execute it you see that it does exactly the same thing as the bad way so x goes from 10 to be minus 10 y goes from minus 10 to be 10 but it is better because it is only one uh one line of code and it is also in my opinion much easier to read now you can do the same trick if you want here so instead of uh instead of saying x is 10 and y is minus 10 you can say x comma y is 10 comma minus 10 right so whenever the number of items basically on the right hand side matches the number of things that you unpack on the left hand side and this also needs to be tuple a particular python uh python data type you can use this kind of uh yeah tuple unpacking multiple assignment or whatever you want to call it right so i'm not sure whether in this case it is worth it but in this case it is definitely worth it so whenever you want to swap variables around using this kind of tuple unpacking can be a very convenient tool to use okay now let's move on to scenario number four trick number four which has to do with dictionaries again a very common problem that many people run into so say that we have a dictionary in our case a dictionary of ages and the names are the keys and the ages are the values and we want to get the age of one person dig in this case but we are not 100 sure whether dig is actually in the in the dictionary that's a problem because if we just say okay age is ages dig right i select this and i run it then of course it crashes with a key error key error dig because dig is not in this dictionary now most people are aware that you need to check uh therefore you need to check whether dig is actually in this in the dictionary and it can be done in the following way in the following bad way you can say okay if dig is actually in the dictionary then we get the age of dig from the dictionary else we fall back to a default value called unknown and if i select this and i run it you see it works it says dig is unknown years old right and if i add dig to the dictionary dig it will say and i select it execute it it will say dig is 51 years old right so gets dig from the dictionary so this works in that sense it's fine but it's ugly because we have these four lines of code just to get something from the dictionary so we can do it better and we can do it better in the following way we can make use of the get function so what i'm typing here is the good way good way let's comment this out okay so what i'm doing here is basically getting the age of dig from the dictionary but if dig is not actually in this dictionary we fall back to a default value unknown so this single line expresses the same logic that took us four lines here right so basically get gets a value from a dictionary but it also takes a default value to fall back to if the value is not in the dictionary so it's a very convenient function to know about now if i select this and i execute it you see it works dig is 51 years old if i remove dig here from the dictionary select it run it it will say dig is unknown years old right because dig is no longer i comment to dig out of this out of the dictionary right so whenever you want to get things from a dictionary but you're not actually sure whether the thing that you want to get is in the dictionary it is nice to use the dot get function of a dictionary which takes a default value in case the value is not in the dictionary okay so let's move on to trick number five scenario number five which has to do with for loops and i think very few people are familiar with with this particular trick now let's take the following scenario in which we have a needle the letter d and we want to search a haystack which is a list of letters to see if d is actually in this list now of course we can do this just by asking if needle in haystack but that's not what we're gonna do here we're gonna use this little search demonstration to make a point so let's start with the bad way so what can we do we can start out by assuming by creating a marker variable called found and assuming that the needle has not been found so we start out by saying found is false then we loop through each letter in the haystack and if the the letter matches the needle we print out found to the to the terminal we set the marker variable to true and then we break the we break the list so we break the loop and then at the end of the loop we check our marker variable to see if the needle was found and if not we print out not found to the terminal so if i select this and i run it it prints out not found which is correct right because our needle d is not in the haystack if i add the needle to the haystack and i run it it will say found which is again correct because of course now the needle is actually in the haystack but this is bad because we have this marker variable which is unnecessary and it also makes the whole logic of the thing a little bit more difficult to understand so how can we improve this well we can make use of the fact that python uh python for loops uh have an else statement which is a bit odd but very powerful so what is the good way the good way is to start out by removing this marker variable here and here and then instead of saying if not found we say else and what else basically means here in this context or in any context is if no break occurred right uh so this whatever is under else is only executed if no break statement occurred during the loop so what we have is the following logic we loop through the haystack if we encounter the needle we break and therefore do not execute this however if we looped through the entire haystack without encountering the needle we have not broken and therefore no break occurred and we execute this print not found right so if i select this i execute it will say found because the needle is in the haystack if i remove the needle from the haystack and i select it and execute it will print not found right so because the needle is no longer in the haystack so uh this works it does exactly the same thing as the the bad way but it is better because it is less lines of code we don't need this marker variable found right and it's just overall more easy to understand easier to understand um so the bottom line is if you want to do something when you've at the end of a loop only if the loop was completely finished and this happens quite a lot right then you should use the else statement in combination with a for loop right so you should think of else as if no break occurred so that's a very convenient trick to know okay so let's move on to trick number six or uh which has to do with file reading a very common thing to do with the text file if you have a simple script is to read the text file and to process each line from the text file uh one by one so let's say that we have the lyrics from Pimpen and Easy by Iced and we want to read those lyrics and print them out one line at the time then we can do something like the following in a bad way so what we do is we open uh the text file we read the context of the text file and we save it in variable text then we split the text by uh slash n so since slash n is a line separation so basically we split the entire text up into individual lines and then we walk through all of these individual lines we print them out to the screen and then afterwards we close now if I select this and I run it you see here in the terminal that it works right so take a look at me everything I own is iced out Pimp baby you can see my wrists with the light out this is how I do it mad bitches in clothes godfather baby only play to my ropes so that works but it is bad it is bad in two ways actually the first is that we we don't actually the the the file object is quite sophisticated and we don't need to read the entire text and we don't need to manually split it we can just loop directly over the file object so basically we can basically the file object supports this supports if you can use a file object as an iterator you can loop through it and it will return you individual lines so if I select this and I run it you will see it also loops through all of the uh the individual lines the only difference being that in this case the line separations are not stripped off which is why you will see you you see actual additional blank lines so this is the the the better way the somewhat better way but there is an even better way what we can do is make use of a so-called context with the with statement and it goes like this with open pimp in an easy the text sf for line and then we remove the closed statement so what this means is that everything that is under with so these two lines are a context uh are executed in a context and this and which means it sounds very sophisticated but it just means basically that before this is executed the file is opened and after this is executed the file is automatically closed so the with statement basically allows us to do something uh without having to bother with cleaning up afterwards right closing a file is a way of cleaning up and if we use a with statement if we use a context then we we don't need to bother with cleaning up so if I take this and I take this and I execute it you see that it still works right still prints each of the lines out to the out to the terminal so especially you you will not usually in python you don't encounter contexts that often so many people may not be familiar with the with statement but especially when working with text files or files in general using the with statement is very powerful because it just makes the logic of your your code cleaner and easier to read okay so let's move on to the seventh and final trick which is maybe not so much a trick as a as a bit of an explanation about try and accept statements so catching exceptions catching errors that occur in in your program now let's say that we want to convert something to an integer right so say that we want to print say that we say okay we print out the screen converting then we convert the string one to an integer so we take a string one and we turn it into the number one right so we change the data type we print it out to the terminal and then we say done I select this and I execute it it's okay converting print out the one that's fine but let's say that we instead of trying to convert one we try to convert x then we run into problem if I put problems if I take this and execute it you see we get a value error right because you cannot convert the string x to an integer that's just not possible python doesn't know how to do that so then what you need to do when I think most people are familiar with that is you use a try accept statement so say try accept and for example we say print conversion filled and then if we take this and we execute it you say you see it prints out conversion filled but the whole program doesn't crash anymore right so we we capture the the error that occurs and then we just let the program continue that's nice but what also what you can also do is use the else statement and that I think many people do not know so conversion successful and uh else is basically the opposite of accept so if no accept so basically we try to convert this to an integer if it doesn't work we print out conversion filled if it does work we print out conversion successful and then at the very end we print out done so if I select this I execute it nothing changes right because it fills it fills to convert the x uh so it prints out conversion filled but if I for example change this to one I select it execute it you see it says converting then prints out one then prints out conversion successful and then says done right so the try statement just like the for loop quite surprisingly supports an else statement which in this context context just means if no exception occurred the try statement even uh supports another statement called the finally statement and finally basically means uh always print uh well we can just move this print statement up here so whatever is under the finally in the finally block is always executed regardless of whether an exception occurred or not and also regardless of whether the the conversion was successful now um so basically you can think of it as follows we try to do the conversion if it didn't work we print out conversion filled if it did work we print out conversion successful but regardless of whether it worked or not we print out done so if I select this execute you see it says converting one conversion successful done just like before basically now the finally statement may seem a little bit pointless because you can just as well you could just as well do this right does does the same thing in this case but it does serve a purpose in the following way let's say that we have a try statement but we have no accept and no else statement so we have this we have only a try and finally and if I take this I execute it all right it works now but say I I change this to an x so an error occurs I execute it right so we get a value error um and then uh if we scroll up a little bit you see that the done which comes from here is still executed and the logic is the following and it's very very convenient to know so if we try this and an error occurs then before this error is actually propagated up in the program so before basically the program crashes we still execute whatever is under finally so it's kind of a you can kind of put your cleanup code here so imagine that you have an open file here and you're trying to do some stuff with the file but an error occurs then you nevertheless want to close the file usually and then you can do that under finally right because finally is executed even if an exception occurred so that's a very convenient uh convenient cleanup function all right so in this case done is printed out whereas if I would have just done uh basically would have just done this huh so just remove the whole uh then done wouldn't have been printed out because as soon as this this line causes a crash the whole program stops so try you can not only have a try accept but you can have a try accept else or you can have a try accept else finally or you can even just have a try finally so try is very versatile construction that you can use in in in various ways to to to handle uh exceptions that occur during the execution of your program okay well that was it I hope you found it uh found it useful and uh thank you for watching


Dear students, in this module we are going to discuss democratic socialism. Democratic socialism is a political and economic theory that seeks to achieve socialist goals through democratic means. And democratic socialists argue that the means of production should be owned and controlled by the people and that our strong social safety net and public services are essential for promoting equality and social justice. It's a very interesting theory that in which democratic socialists think that all the resources of any country or any society should be a collective property and people should be able to decide how these resources will be distributed. Ideally it's a very attractive idea, however when we see it pragmatically and practically we feel that this is practically impossible because decision making process is not necessary for all the people of the society to be included in the democratic process. For every minute detail or every minute policy we cannot engage all the people in it. It is that the representatives of the political democratic system, the representatives of the people are engaged in the decision making process by sitting on powerful positions and the common public masses are reflecting through their decisions and policies. But will this reflection be justified and acceptable to the people? Because we see that even today in the democratic system, people are not satisfied with their democratically elected representatives. It starts to be dissatisfaction in a very short period of time and people come to the streets for the protest and according to their will or wish, that democratic system is not able to perform. So in the democratic socialist system, because it is about distribution of resources and equal distribution of resources, we will have to see whether equal distribution of resources by use of public behaviour is possible or not. So in Pakistan, the democratic socialist ideas have influenced political movements and labour unions although the country has not experienced the significant socialist revolution. The relationship between the state and economy in a democratic socialist system is characterized by a high level of state intervention and planning with the aim of ensuring that the resources are distributed according to the need. So the need is also a question mark that who will decide the need because the need of any individual can decide for themselves or an external or third person will decide that we can objectively define the need or base this subjective opinion on it. So again it is a criticism from a social, from a capitalistic point of view whether democratic socialism is feasible or possible. In today's world, it is a food for thought for you to see which country is more closer to the democratic socialism.


Live from Orlando, Florida, it's theCUBE, covered.conf18, brought to you by Splunk. Welcome back to Orlando, everybody, home of Disney World, and this week, home of theCUBE. I'm Dave Vellante, and he's Stu Miniman. Stephen Hatch is here, he's the manager of Enterprise Logging Services at Cox Automotive. Stephen, thanks for coming on theCUBE. Thank you. So, you've been with Splunk for a while. We're here at Conf18, Logging Services, Enterprise Logging Services. When you think of Splunk, the roots, Splunk go back to sort of log files, analyzing log files, it's in your title. Yes. Essentially. You must be pretty intimately tied to, as a practitioner to this capability, but talk about your role and what you do at Cox. Primarily, the role is to be the evangelist, the enabler, and the center of excellence when it comes down to getting those best practices propagated within the enterprise.  What qualified you to do that? You were a practitioner prior to this, so you got your hands dirty, and you kind of now elevated to. My prior role was a site operations or site reliability engineer and then manager, and so having that background, I've been in IT since 96, so I'm a little old in the game, but basically having that operational knowledge, and knowing how to think big picture when things are happening or transpiring, or to reverse and go back and find that root cause analysis. 96, just to pop, my friend, okay? So, talk a little, Stu, we were talking off camera about the number of brands that Cox Automotive has, Cox and Kelly Blue Book and numerous others, I mean, dozens. Each of these is kind of its own data silo. How do you guys go about using Splunk? Are you able to break down some of those silos? Maybe you could share that with us. Yeah, so we have been successful on a lot of the big three really, the Kelly Blue Book, Mannheim, as well as AutoTrader, to really break in. A lot of that was because of our already previous relationships with team members and leaders. On the other side of the coin is the newly acquired companies that are not in Atlanta, Georgia, that are in places like Groton, Connecticut, South Jordan, Utah, upstate New York, as well as the Toronto area in Canada. And so, WebEx, join me, email just won't cut it. You actually have to sit down with these people and really showcase your business case, your model, and what you're trying to bring to the table. But of course, the approach is always important. And you're using Splunk to do that as a collaboration tool as well? Yes, sir, yep. Explain that a little bit. So, a lot of times, as you mentioned, the silos, you know, as a bigger brand now, it's no longer an excuse for you to only be responsible for your data and not showcase it or share that data. Because we're thinking about the entire lifecycle, COXSIDOMotive, and this entity of COXSIDOMotive, that's important to us now. So for you to hold tight or to hoard your data or your metrics and not share them, that's not good business anymore. Yeah, so Stephen, you know, we've talked to a lot of companies that do M&A and it's usually like, well, this is the products we use, these are the structures that we have. One of the things we hear from Splunk is that you can get to, you know, your data your way. Maybe, how does the kind of Splunk modeling and how you look at data fit into that M&A? Is that an enabler for you to be able to get that in? Yeah, and so when you can showcase the ability of how the data comes in and quickly, that's the key word, right? To showcase how that data can be very valuable to them, especially to their stakeholders. That's when light bulbs will go off. And again, it's the stakeholders and then champions that we need to bring to the table to make sure that we can get full adoption. Yeah, we've also, you know, Dave's been to the show a few times, it's my first time and what I've really heard a bunch of is the people that know how to use Splunk, they're super valuable, that valuable inside the company. We've heard people, you know, they get training, people inside the company, they look to get hired. Tell us a little bit about what you've seen, what it means to your role inside the company and as you network with your peers here. It's a lot of exposure. A lot of people are very anxious to get some type of insights into their world, their infrastructure, their applications, their business tools.  And so our job is to align with their KPIs. You know, over the last couple of years, that's what the journey that we've been on is to now revisit the data that we just ingested. You know, that's the basic foundation. We want to elevate now and really get more mature and to align with those business KPIs. Meaning they have this tribal knowledge in their head. Yes, sir. And you want to codify that so that it can be shared. Correct. Go about doing that. Is it sitting on a whiteboard and understanding that? It can be a whiteboard. It can be over a coffee. If I need to get on a plane and go see them in person and to really just listen and ask the questions when it's time. But again, listen and really understand what's important to them. What is important to their business, to their function, to their silos. CoxIberMotive has five, what we call pillars, whether it's international finance, marketing, retail, or media, and each one of those owners, over time, wants the specific value. So if you go and have a chalkboard session, whiteboard session with one of these folks, how do you operationalize it? You got to figure out where the data exists so that you can align with what's in their head. Is that right? And then how do you do that? How do you scale it? Well, so again, you have to start from the top. If you start from the bottom, you'll be in the weeds until the end of time so the more efficient manner is to start from the top and realize those KPIs from those leaders, those stakeholders. And then from there, tool like ITSI, which is basically built around services and entities and aligning to their service decomposition model. And that right there allows you to stay consistent and efficient on getting that information. So you start top down. Yes, sir. But ultimately, people are going to want granularity. So you start, so as a top down, bottom up type of approach where you actually drill, drill, drill, drill, drill and then get to the point where you can answer all those granular questions. And then by doing that, if I understand it correctly, you know it sums to the top line. Is that fair? Yeah, yeah. There's a point in time where you say, you know what, I could really now enhance or enrich the data by a dataset that I know where it is. So the key path will get you to a certain point and then define that happy medium or that common denominator from the data that you already have on premise or from your apps, wherever they reside, that's where you can meet the gap. Otherwise you'll never get it done. You'll just end up boiling the ocean. Yes, sir. All right, so when we talked to you two years ago, you were using Splunk Cloud. When we talked to practitioners, it's the things that they're managing. A lot of times now, most of it's not what they own. So how do I get the right information? How do I manage that environment? Talk to us a little bit about what you've seen on the maturation of Splunk Cloud. If there's anything in 7.2 or Splunk Next, that's exciting you to help you do your job even better. Oh man, so of course the key note today, the DSP, the processing layer that's in front of the cloud or in front of the indexers now, where in real time I can now route data specifically from a security standpoint. If there's some type of event, I can, without having to go through all the restarts and configuration management and everything else, I can simply put something in there right there and move the data or mask the data. The ability with the infrastructure app, that's exciting to me, as well as all the feature updates for ITSI, enterprise security, as well as the cloud itself. Can we do a little Splunk 101 for my benefit? So I heard today from one of the product folks that it used to be when you added another indexer, you had to add storage and compute simultaneously, so whether or not you needed the storage, you had to add it or vice versa. So an indexer is what, is it essentially a Splunk node? It's a Splunk node, it can be basically a Linux host that actually has the agent running as an indexer with the attached disk. Right, okay, and it used to be you had to buy that in chunks kind of like HCI, right? And you couldn't scale storage independent of compute. That's correct. And what that meant is you were paying for stuff that you might not need. Correct. So with 7.2, I guess it is, you can split those and you get more granular. What does that mean for you? Well, being a now four year customer of Splunk cloud and anytime we went to the next version of our, or licensed the next step up, currently we're on about six terabytes when we go up to eight, that then entailed more indexers being added to the cluster, which meant more time for the replication and search factors to be met, which can take however long and then, or if there is any kind of issue with the indexer where one had to be pulled out and another one introduced, how long does that take? Now, with the decoupling of the compute from the storage, it's minutes. And so it's a fraction of the time. If I understand, because that, I understood it real well in an appliance, but it's the same architecture if it's done in the cloud. Is that correct? Essentially, actually it's a new architecture in my mind where now it's able to scale more and then there's, I'm not sure how much they talked about, but there's a potential of the elasticity of it. And so now I don't have to be so fixed. I can on certain times expand the cluster for search performance or bring it back down when it's not needed. Yeah, some of the promise of cloud. Yes, sir. Splunk cloud. It's like the Billy Bean, the five tool star.  So I take, I'm inferring you'd expect to use this capability in the near future. Very much so. Great. What else is on your horizon? What are the cool stuff you're working on and since you want to share with us? In addition to our leveraging Splunk cloud for four years, next year we plan to move away from our current SIM tool into enterprise security. So it's very exciting to hear the continually updating that product. And so our security team has been knocking on my door for the last six months to really get that started. So once we get there, we'll start the migration efforts and get Splunk cloud now enabled with the enterprise security to really empower our security team and stay ahead of our threats. So I've been around a long time and ever since I can remember being in this business, customers have wanted to consolidate the number of vendors with whom they work.  It sounds like with Splunk, you're approaching this as a platform that you can use for a variety of different use cases. That is correct. Now whether or not you reduce the number of vendors is maybe a separate conversation. But I guess the question I have is, how are you using Splunk in new ways? It sounds like it's permeating the line of business. SecOps, et cetera, is that an accurate picture if you could describe? Yeah, so Splunk itself, the core is the platform for so many different other functions within the business. You have security. You have the development group DevOps where from a CI CD perspective, now they can measure the metrics or the latency in between when they create a car, say in rally, all the way to the very end of the line. What are all those metrics that are there that they can leverage to increase their productivity? Obviously infrastructure. As we consolidate all of our data centers down, wouldn't it be nice to know if the specific low balancers or switches are still having traffic traverse them and to actually get a depiction of the consolidation effort? From a virtualization standpoint, isn't it powerful to know how many devices ESX hosts are actually fully being utilized and how many are actually vacant and how much money can be saved if we were actually to turn down those specific blades or hosts or VMs that aren't being leveraged but they're sitting there, taking up valuable resources? I remember when Splunk, right around the time they went public, I remember two instances, maybe three, there was a MPP database company, there was a large three letter firm and there was a kind of an open source specialist. And I heard the same thing from each of them was we have the Splunk killer. This is like five, six years ago. It seems like the Splunk killer was Splunk. And it never really happened. Why is it? Why is Splunk so effective?  You want to use the best thing for Cox Automotive. That's correct. What is it about Splunk that sets them apart, puts them in the lead? The scale capabilities, having this type of environment, what the conference is and the sales group and the support groups, very intentional about listening, having workshops where they come on premise to help us out on our use cases to really educate their users because the more their users are elevated from a knowledge standpoint, the more they will then exercise the application. If they all stay basic, why would I need another component of Splunk? Why would I need enterprise security? Why would I need to expand my subscription into the cloud? The more I can exercise it, the more I'll need. So it's kind of a give-get. They come in knowing that if they expose you to other best practices, you're going to be more effective in the use of Splunk and you might apply it into other parts of your business. My appetite will grow. My user's appetite will grow. And these are freebies that they're doing? Service is freebies or are they paid for services? They have no problem coming in, supplying the necessary ammunition or food to entice, to have folks come in. But it's powerful to have all the engineers in there to really show us how things work. Because again, it's a win-win.  Yes, sir. Chiefs of your team, right? That's correct. Were you a football player? For a little while, yes. Now I coach, yeah, so that's my... You coach? Oh, what? Eight year olds. Kitty football? Oh, awesome. Is that Pop Warner these days still or is it like that? Flag football or tackle? Tackle football. Really? Yep. Yes, my son is eight and he's playing fullback right now. I'm very excited. Happy father.  He's going to be bigger than I think, than his father. Yeah. Yes, sir. That's awesome. Well, listen, thanks very much, Stephen, for coming on theCUBE. It was really a pleasure meeting you. Appreciate it. Thank you very much. Yes, sir. All right, keep it right there, everybody. Stu and I will be back with our next guest. We're live from SplunkConf 18. You're watching theCUBE.