Pivot · Nov 12, 2021

GE’s Three-Way Split, Facebook Scraps “Sensitive”Ad-Targeting Categories, and Friend of Pivot, Jonathan Haidt

Automatic transcript of the end of the episode, from 52:54. Speakers are labeled by software and may contain errors. Highlighted passages are Scott’s predictions.

Kara Swisher · 52:54 Age. They do. Guest · 52:54 And he, you know, he didn't exactly deny it, but he said, you know, we're working on it. We're working on it. And what they're working on, it seems, was Instagram kids. Yes. So, you know, yes, it's their obligation, and they should be held liable for harms to preteens. The second thing is we should also talk about raising the age in COPPA. You know, as you guys know, when COPPA was introduced, the child... Was it Child Online Protection Act? When it was introduced in 1998, I think it was, the age was 16. They said at 16, you're old enough to give away your data and make deals. And then the lobbyists pushed it down from 16 to 13. And all this was done with zero concern for mental health. This was just about legal, you know, privacy rights. So I think we need to revisit it, and and I think the age should be raised to 16 for a certain purpose, not for everything. Obviously, kids can create accounts of all kinds, but there are certain platforms that are clearly dangerous for kids, and I think we need to figure out a way to keep them off until 16. Kara Swisher · 53:46 Yeah. Can I just say when they? Then they introduced Facebook for kids when they heard about it, and a Facebook executive said it to me, And I literally... All I said was no. No. And they're like, what do mean no? I'm like, no. No. There was no... I was like, how dare you? Guest · 53:58 There isn't... That's right. There is no form of it that would be... Kara Swisher · 54:00 That was my first thing. I'm like, no. No. Where can I run-in front of this Yeah? To stop you from doing this awful thing? Yeah. Exactly. Go ahead, Scott. Scott Galloway · 54:07 So in addition to your work on this emerging mental health crisis among teens, you've done, a big body of your work is around polarization and how our society is being kind of torn in two. I'm curious, have you... Do you have any thoughts on quote unquote this large idea around the metaverse and what that might do around polarization and the role it might play either in mental health or specifically around around polarization? Guest · 54:34 Yes. Yeah. And so this is gonna be even darker and more twisted. But Scott Galloway · 54:39 Here we go. Guest · 54:40 You know, know, I hope... Assume you look... A lot of us saw that we Scott Galloway · 54:42 knew that was worse. Yeah. Is the worst day of my life. The worst day so far. So far. That's right. Kara Swisher · 54:48 You two are a laugh riot. The Parisians. Guest · 54:51 We are. There's kind a dark Scott Galloway · 54:53 humor here. Wait till we start drinking. Guest · 54:55 I'm gonna make the prediction that 2021 is gonna be remembered as the calmest, sanest, most polite, most civil year of the 2020. So we'll see. We'll see. I could be wrong, but we'll see. Let's talk again in 2020. Kara Swisher · 55:06 Some ketamine immediately. So Guest · 55:11 so look. We are... You know, a lot of my work is on how we evolved to be deeply religious tribal creatures that organize themselves into a fish infusion societies shaped by constant conflict with nearby societies, but we're also good at making peace with them as well. That's the way we evolved. And in the last few hundred years, after hundreds of years of war, we decided, you know what? Let's find a different way to live, and we developed liberal democracies. We developed institutions. They took a long long time to build. It's hard to get them quite right, but they do generally get better over time, and that's the Western liberal democracies, which then end up giving rights and civil rights and discovering all kinds of of ways to make life better for everyone. So that's the trajectory we're on until 2011. And things began to get really weird in the twenty tens. I think we all see it now. But this is what we first began to see on campus in 2014. Things are getting really weird. It's as though there's a glitch in the matrix. But what's really happening here is these virtual worlds are touching down. Like, what happens in Fortnite... My son plays Fortnite. Mhmm. What happens there has zero effect on me or anyone else. It's closed. But Twitter and Facebook and Instagram are sort of... They're sort of like metaversey things that touch the real world sometimes, especially Twitter. Leaders live in fear of Twitter. So imagine now that rather than this metaverse, this weird world in which we have no idea what the average person thinks, but the activists, the extremists on the far right, the far left, they get... It's like they get little dark guns. They get to shoot people and and cause pain to people anywhere at any time. So imagine now that our entire world is like this. Imagine now that everywhere you go, there are anonymous people. Imagine a public square in which people are masked. You have no idea who is who, and there's no consequences for bad behavior. So, you know, if you saw that video that that Mark Zuckerberg put out about about how wonderful it's... The metaverse is gonna be, and you can play cards with people who are far away, it's gonna be great. Like, no. That is your best case version of what it could be. And we know from experience, a lot of these platforms start out kinda nice and fun, and they can get dark pretty quickly. Kara Swisher · 57:10 So so when you think about this, so if you think this is the happiest time, this is the light before the darkness coming, what is your biggest worry looking at sort of their visions that you saw? Now, Micro... Let's leave Microsoft's aside. That was sort of hang out in a fake office where you're a cartoon character without legs. Mhmm. But what... When you looked at their visions, what did you think? Guest · 57:31 You know, I was always on the left. Mhmm. And when I began studying political psychology, I realized there's some very good ideas on the right. And I don't mean the MAGA right. I mean, like, the intellectual conservatives or people like Hayek or Oakshott. And I realized, you know what? You actually need the give and take of of ideas of, like, fast progress. No. Slow it down. It's dangerous. That's the traditional left right attention that actually makes a liberal democracy better. The online world that we live in was designed by engineers, some of whom are libertarians, some of whom are progressive, none of whom are social conservatives or intellectuals. There are no psychologists involved, no sociologists. So this world that we now live in was created by people whose only incentive was grow it fast, grow it big, make it cool, and it's turned out very, very badly. So that's phase one or phase one and two. We're about to go into the next phase, which is gonna be much bigger and also designed by clueless people who have a business incentive and no understanding of human psychology or sociology. So I just, you know, I don't see any reason to think this is gonna work out well. To the extent that it becomes all encompassing, I think it's gonna do far greater damage to our kids than what's already happening and far greater damage to our democracy. I could be wrong on either count, but if current trends continue, I don't think I am. Scott Galloway · 58:41 So just in terms of, you know, I call it cancel culture, Cara calls it accountability culture. Do you see what's happening? I was even, I was on CNN talking about Aaron Rodgers and I thought, am I piling on? Is just easy to kind of pile onto the sky and become one of those not mass people but score points or be a guardian of gotcha by piling on this guy. Do you think it's, where do you think we are in the cycle of the Twitter mob or you and I experienced it or observe it I think a little bit of campuses where some people say there's a bit of a surrender to the narrative or we're gonna come after you and threaten your career, whatever it might be. At the same time, people should be called out. And there are some wonderful things about holding people accountable. Where do you think we are in cycle, if you will? Do you think it's peaked? Do you think it's gonna get a lot worse? Where where are we? Guest · 59:33 So so I think a... So my next book is gonna be called Life After Babble, Adapting to a World We May Never Again Share. [Ad break] Guest · 59:41 And a key idea in it a key idea in it is that there's the real world in which what the average person thinks matters to some extent, and that is still true on election day. We actually do have a way of measuring what what people think. And then there's the sort of the virtual world or the post babble parts of the virtual world in which you have no clue what the average person thinks and it doesn't matter. What matters is the dynamics, and that's what changed around 2014, 2015, the dynamics. And you can call it accountability if you like. It is a form of accountability, and accountability in the abstract is a very good thing. You have to have accountability. But imagine if tomorrow... Imagine if a world becomes fully accountable, but the accountability, there's no due process. There's no friction. So anyone can hold anyone accountable with no friction, no due process, no context. Everyone's free to put their worst read on whatever you said or did Mhmm. Put it up, and have other people jump on. This is not a world in which we get responsible behavior. This is a world in which suddenly everyone is now afraid. Everyone says they're walking on eggshells, And I would guess most of the cases of people being held accountable when you dig into them, and I've dug into a lot of them, are incredibly unjust. So I think that Twitter is just not a good mechanism for proving accountability in a society. Scott Galloway · 1:00:56 So what do you do though? I know there's no silver bullet, but what do you do? If people agree with you that there's a lack of nuance and due process, how do you reintegrate that into the discourse? Guest · 1:01:05 So I... Yeah. So I think that the biggest thing we need to do is move away from our focus on content moderation. I think one thing we learned from Francis Haugen Mhmm. Is that what they get that, you know, maybe 10% of what's... What we count as hate speech and less than 1% Kara Swisher · 1:01:19 They don't catch it. Guest · 1:01:19 Of intimidation and violence. Yeah. So let's forget let's forget the focus on content moderation. It's all about the virality and the rate limiters. I would much rather have that. Kara Swisher · 1:01:28 Architecture. Yeah. Guest · 1:01:29 It's the architecture. Kara Swisher · 1:01:29 I had an interview with several executives at at at all these companies, Twitter, Facebook, and they all said it's the... It's the... When they changed it from accuracy to virality, when... That's when everything went askew. So... Scott Galloway · 1:01:42 I I just gotta ask you both a question. From an outsider's perspective, I look at Mark Zuckerberg, and I'm like, most dangerous person in the world, total fucking sociopath. You have both sat down with him and looked him in the eyes and seen how his body language, how he reacts to ideas. And I think there is a power and an honesty to having a relationship with someone. What are your thoughts on Mark Zuckerberg? I think he's the most powerful person on the planet. What... Kara Swisher · 1:02:05 I think he's the most dangerous and... But not a sociopath. Scott Galloway · 1:02:08 Okay. Kara Swisher · 1:02:08 But that's just... Scott Galloway · 1:02:09 Go ahead, Sean. Yeah. Guest · 1:02:10 Yeah. No. I... And I agree with Cara. I think that he he ends up being dangerous because he controls Facebook. But I think the way to understand him... I think he's not... He's definitely not a sociopath. I don't think he's greedy. I don't think he's motivated by money. Mhmm. I think the way to understand him is that Facebook is his baby. He created it. He's very ambitious, and he is focused on growth over everything else. Yeah. I think he'd like to do good if he could, but nothing nothing will interfere with his his desire to have it grow as fast as possible and win. Kara Swisher · 1:02:38 Bingo. Guest · 1:02:39 And there, I think... So I'll just close by just saying this. You know, people say, is is Facebook like a tobacco company? I say, no. Facebook, the best analogy is the British East India company. It's like this giant company that was, you know, given a license by the crown, and they... Oh, go, you know, go start wars. Go conquer people. Start famines. Who cares? We're not monitoring. Kara Swisher · 1:02:56 Yeah. Guest · 1:02:57 So that would be the way to think about it. Kara Swisher · 1:02:58 Alright. We'll figure out the metaphors, but there's several of them, all conflicting ones. Jonathan, thank you so much. You're a frigging bummer. But I'm looking forward to seeing your your articles and research on this stuff. Thank you so much. We really appreciate it. Guest · 1:03:11 Thank you, Cara. Thank you, Scott. Kara Swisher · 1:03:13 Alright, Scott. One more quick break. He was amazing. We'll be back for predictions. [Ad break] — Predictions segment begins — Kara Swisher · 1:04:35 Okay, Scott. Give us this week's prediction. It's gotta be fast. I gotta go to a parent teacher conference. Scott Galloway · 1:04:40 2022 is gonna be the the year of staggering M and A all in the pursuit of a super app. If you look at the number of everybody used to recruit or people used to wanna recruit people from the big four. Now the big four are all recruiting people from Alibaba and Tencent because the war for to create the super app is gonna be huge. And what's interesting is, and this goes to my prediction and it's, I'll get shit on Twitter but it's about Twitter. I think that these companies, social media platforms can kind of manipulate their earnings by either not cleaning up fake accounts or cleaning them up. I think Jack Dorsey is gonna see God over the next two months clean up a ton of accounts, show shitty earnings and growth, puke on himself, the stock will go down to 40, and then Square is gonna acquire Twitter and try and become a Tencent. — Predictions segment ends — Kara Swisher · 1:05:27 Yeah. I like... I... It's funny. I'm writing about super apps. It's it's a really interesting concept. It's suddenly the word of the day. So we'll see what happens. And I agree, they're all coalescing. And I... You know, interestingly, had an interesting discussion about, with, Ken Buck about this. He thinks there should be super apps because then there's no individualized monopolies in, like, search or whatever. It... He thinks it improves the situation. Interesting. Interesting idea, but that's a very good prediction. So big news, we're officially announcing Pivot MIA. Join us in Miami this coming February fourteenth to sixteenth. Follow us on Twitter at Pivot Pod to find out more information and tickets when they become available. We have to think what MIA should stand for besides metaverse in action. Not really. There'll be no metaverse. We are gonna be in person with tequila. Scott, what... Why should people come to Pivot MIA? Scott Galloway · 1:06:17 I think you and I are committed to having the world's most important and enjoyable gathering in the history of business. That's my goal. Kara Swisher · 1:06:24 Alright. But I I need something sexier. I need something sexier. Scott Galloway · 1:06:26 I don't know. Kara Swisher · 1:06:27 Everybody gets to sleep at Scott's house. That's why. We're gonna have a big pajama party at Scott's house. What do you say? Scott Galloway · 1:06:33 That's like the worst Cinemax movie ever, literally. That's like, oh my god. Who's he? Get him out of... No. No. We're we're staying at the Faina or the one hotel. It's gonna be amazing. We have the best restaurants, the best speakers, people like Jonathan Haidt, Assata Motoren. We're gonna sex it up. This is gonna be fantastic. MIA, Miami. I'm really excited about it. This is our first event together. I'm I'm really excited. Kara Swisher · 1:06:58 We're very excited. We'll have more information soon. Okay, Scott. That's the show. As always, you can send your questions to n y mag dot com slash pivot. We're digging into that mailbag soon, so send us something good. We'll be back on Tuesday for more. Scott, read us out. Scott Galloway · 1:07:11 Today's show was produced by Lara Naaman, Evan Engel, and Taylor Griffin. Ernie Indra Todd engineered this episode. Thanks also to Drew Burrows and Mia Silverio. Make sure you subscribe to the show on Apple Podcast. If you're an Android user, check us out on Spotify or frankly wherever you listen to podcasts. Thank you for listening to Pivot from New York Magazine and Box Media. We'll be back later this week for another breakdown of all things tech and business. Required reading for any parent, And I don't read a lot of books on parenting, but I absolutely love this one. It's The Coddling of the American Mind by our guest today, Jonathan Haidt. Not only talks about social media, but also talks just about raising kids and what it means to have productive, civic minded children. Thanks for listening.