Big Technology Podcast - How Big Tech Influence Shops Shape The Antitrust Conversation In Washington — with Adam Kovacevich

Episode Date: June 24, 2021

Adam Kovacevich is the CEO of the Big Tech-funded Chamber of Progress. The former Google policy executive joins Big Technology Podcast to discuss the origins of his organization and why Big Tech would rather fund him vs. stick their own necks out. Tune in for a revealing conversation of what happens behind the scenes in Big Tech's battle against regulation.

Hello and welcome to the big technology podcast, a show for cool-headed, nuanced conversation, of the tech world and beyond. Joining us today is Adam Kavakovich, the head of the Chamber of Progress, an advocacy organization that's funded by Amazon, Facebook, Google, Uber, and a handful of other technology companies. and today we're going to find out what that organization is about and what these companies are getting for their money. Adam, welcome to the show. Thanks for having me. So let's start with your background. You worked in public policy for Google for 12 years. That's right. And we've like had conversations in the past about what what you did there, but just for the benefit of the audience, what type of work were you engaged in while you were at Google? Sure. Well, even going further back Before that, I started my career in Democratic politics as a congressional aid in the late 1990s.

Yeah, you worked for Joe Lieberman. Yeah, yeah. Well, my first job was actually, I'm from Bakersfield, California. My first job was for my local congressman who was a guy named Cal Dooley. He was one of the co-founders of the new Democrat coalition, which were the group of about 50 centrist House Democrats viewed themselves as very pro-tech. They were some of the first members of Congress to make sort of delegation trips out to Silicon. and Valley companies really were excited about being associated with tech and all the exciting things happening there in the late 90s. And that kind of set me on a path. But yesterday, I didn't work for

Joe Lieberman as his spokesman in the Senate and then in his presidential campaign and other campaign in South Carolina. And then ultimately ended up at Google for about a dozen years. I worked on a number of issues, competition policy, privacy, surveillance issues, broadband, IP issues. And then for the last two years before starting this group, I led North America and Asia-Pacific government relations for Lyme, one of the shared scooter companies. Yeah, so you were at Google basically trying to help them and with beneficial outcomes on the policy front. Yep. Yep. Okay. So, you know, you then move on to Lyme and start the Chamber of Progress. Chamber of Progress is an interesting organization because I'll just ask the question then we'll have you chime in, but it supports traditional left issues like

fighting climate change and inclusivity, but it also primarily seems to be fighting hard against the antitrust climate against tech. So how does something like this come about? Because it does seem like a lot of Democrats are actually very much in favor of reigning in big tech. So it is somewhat of a Frankenstein of an organization if you think about it. I don't know if that's a compliment or insult, but I will explain how we ended up at this at the focus that we had, which is, look, I think that certainly me and a lot of the people who worked in tech, I think, have been attracted to the ways in which technology has helped achieve progressive goals, making information and goods more available, reducing barriers, reducing gatekeepers and information markets and

things like that. And all of that I think of that has been a positive. But I think there are two big questions that we kind of find ourselves facing. One is, is tech's future going to be as progressive as its past, are people going to be able to enjoy the benefits of technology in an equal way, right, equal across all Americans? And secondly, is the tech industry itself going to operate fairly? I think, in my mind, most tech policy right now is really about is tech as an industry operating fairly and using its power responsibly, whether that's towards workers, towards consumers, towards other companies, towards communities? And there are some hard questions there.

And we are going to be working on those. But candidly, I think one of the things I've seen talking to a lot of people in tech companies is that there is an underlying commitment to things like bold action on climate change, more inclusive democratic society, supporting things like voting rights, stronger social safety net, dealing with income inequality. And so we're speaking up on those issues as well. Reading between the lines of your answer, it does seem like the organization is primarily going to be focused on the tech stuff.

Yeah, I think we're, we are primarily focused on, on tech issues for sure. So, I mean, I'll be honest, it does seem a little opportunistic to me because, you know, you have the Democrats take the House and the Senate and the presidency in 2020. And they're one of their big agenda items is that they're going to tackle big tech antitrust. They just released five bills that are, you know, geared into, geared to do that. And, you know, if you were cynical, you would say, okay, the best way to steer this legislation. packages to say that you align with their values, but also push back, you know, in a friendly way against their, you know, what seems like a growing consensus about taking on big tech. So is it just me or is the timing a little convenient on this one? Well, I will say this, this is an idea that had been

kind of rattling around in my head for the last two or three years before any particular fight on any particular issue. And I think that's because one of the things that I was seeing was that, you know, this tech is not cute as an industry anymore, right? It's, it's big, it's powerful. This is what you write about and your podcast is about. And I don't, and it's honeymoon period politically is over. And by the way, it probably should be over, right? I mean, everyone, I think wants governments to scrutinize powerful interests, including tech companies. And so that makes sense to me. I think one of the things you see, though, is a divide among Democrats. And we are focused solely on Democrats. about how to respond to the tech industry's power. There's one camp that says we should dissolve that

power. This is sort of the anti-monopoly kind of neo-brandycean camp. And I don't agree with that view, but I think that that view has a long, proud tradition. I don't believe that view has more than maybe 15%, 20% support among elected Democrats at the federal state local level. I think there's a bigger section of policymakers on the Democratic side who are more interested in channeling the tech industry's power towards pro-social positive ends. Now, we can debate and should debate about what those things are, but I think that's where a majority of policymakers are. I also think there's a little bit of a gap here between the sentiment of most voters and consumers, including most Democratic voters and consumers towards tech and the kind of sentiment that

I think you, you know, you see maybe more reflected if you spend all day on Twitter, as I do, by the way, too. And I know you probably do too. So I think there's a lot of time there for sure. Yeah. There, there, I think there's a gap there that is a little, it can be a little bit of a political, um, market failure almost. Right. But okay. So I, I guess, you know, coming back to this whole, um, the political, like it just, you know, I know this, this idea has been in your head for a while. Um, but it does seem like, all right, well, if I was going to try to find a way to steer the Democrats, this is the type of organization I would put together, say, hey, we're on board with you in terms of climate change and inclusivity and also and take it easy on these tech giant companies.

Maybe we don't want to, you know, bring to bear the package of the strongest anti-trust legislation that we can. So is there like, you know, in terms of the formation of your organization, are you going to deny completely that it's, you know, just a little bit political? Well, it's certainly, we are a political actor, right? We're a trade association advocacy. The way that this thing has been put together, sorry, go ahead. Yeah, no, I think that there's no doubt that it's meeting the moment.

We have a very polarized politics, right? And so most traditional trade associations don't have an ideological bent. But there were already a number of groups on the right, on the free market side, sort of representing the tech industry. and there wasn't as much of that on the left and center left. I do think that in some ways, the goals that we're putting forward are very in line with the goals that many tech industry leaders and employees have, which is to say that they want an inclusive society.

They want to see societal progress. They're oftentimes pretty committed to things like redistribution, but they're a little more skeptical of regulation, not to say regulation's bad, because some regulation, I think, makes a lot of sense here. But I think one of the things we're seeing, I see right now is I think in tech's political honeymoon period in roughly late 90s through the end of the Obama era, tech was seen as kind of doing no wrong. And then I think with the beginning of the Trump era through today, sometimes you see a dynamic of tech doing no right, a political, a political image. Again, I just don't think that's where most voters are. And so I think one of the things

we're trying to inject into the policy debate is, well, what do people really want from their tech, right? What are the values they want protected? And let's debate some of these things. If you think that being progressive means being anti-company, we might not have a lot to talk about, although I respect the people who feel that way. But if you want to achieve progressive goals, a variety of other ways, then let's talk about how we best achieve that. Yeah. Okay. So I'm glad you're at least admitting that there is some, you know, opportunism here because

you're right. The big tech money has been on the right. And now it's coming to the left. I guess they do want to spray it around a little bit to make sure they cover, you know, all their bases. Yeah. I mean, my experience, I've worked at working at Google was that actually Google and most of the big companies invested.

support, frankly, in, you know, it provided support for a number of groups across the political spectrum, left, right, center, industry groups, civil rights groups. So I don't, I'm not sure that I would, I'm not sure I totally agree that the, I just think there have been more entities probably on the right than on the left and center left. One of the things that I've heard is that there was a moment, I think maybe around 2016, where Kent Walker, who is at Google, who still is at Google runs policy and legal there, saw a growing antitrust sentiment on the left, especially with Elizabeth Warren, and spoke internally about a need to satiate the left. And so do you think that maybe something that you're doing here, you mean, you work closely with him, is that potentially

downstream of that of that goal that Walker had? I don't remember that. And I certainly, I don't certainly don't remember Kent talking about satiating the left. Right. I do think anybody who works in this field of policy advocacy gets used to a dynamic, which is that whenever you're going to go meet with a policymaker, a federal, state, or local policymaker, you try to find areas of agreement. And you might disagree on certain things, but I think that is a pretty natural thing. There's a lot of issues, for example, when I was at Google, we worked on surveillance reform, where you had a very interesting left-right coalition, right? And so I think, you know, with any given issue, you're going to try to find kind of who you're,

allies are, and they may not be your ally on the next fight. So I don't know that, I don't think that people, a sophisticated approach to policy advocacy would say satiate the left. Frankly, policymakers, I think are more sophisticated than that. But if there's areas where you, you know, you might agree with them, then I think most policymakers might say, look, I agree with you on this. Let's work together. But that doesn't mean I'm not going to criticize you on this other front. And they do. Right. So I'm curious what your personal politics are, you know, running this organization. So, you know, I am not registered to any political party. So this is not a purity test, but are you registered Democrat?

Yeah, and you are. So, you know, you've also in the past, you know, I read about the fact that you've helped campaign for Republicans and, you know, we're out there on the campaign trail with Tom Cotton back in the day. I mean, not that that's prohibited or anything like that. No, no, Tom Cotton. Yeah, Tom is one of my friends from. good friends from college, he knows full well that I disagree with him on 95% of his, um, uh, you know, political positions, but, um, but he's a friend, right? And I actually don't think it's possible to have, uh, and, and why is to have friendships of people who are,

you know, you don't agree with politically. Yeah, no, no doubt. And it would be a shame if those, if those go away. But it's also, I mean, there's a difference between having a friend and then also campaign helping someone campaign, uh, for, for, you know, policy issues because then you're actually going ahead and advancing. And like I would never ever suggest that, you know, Democrats shouldn't be friends with Republicans. Right. But it's also, but yeah, when I, when I have someone on who's the head of, you know, potentially, you know, a organization that builds itself as center left and then goes campaigning with, you know, right leaning public politicians. I'm like, is there what, where does the rubber meet the road here? Is this actually something, you know,

that truly believes in the values that it disposes or is it politically experienced? Yeah. I've worked in Democratic. I've worked been in Democratic politics since 1999, before that. So, you know, I've been, I was one of the founding staff of the new Democratic movement and been, you know, on the boards of several of groups in the center left. So I think my own personal, I'm, I'm very comfortable with my own personal politics. I wasn't Tom's campaign manager or anything like that. But, you know, but supported him as a friend. That, again, that doesn't mean I agree with him on most things. I certainly don't. But I do think it's, you know, look, I think most people understand the distinction there. Okay, fair enough. I wanted to bring it up. So one of the things that you mentioned earlier was interesting. You talked about how tech employees believe in a lot of these progressive ideals. Employees is maybe the key word there because, you know, the way there's been a criticism in terms of the labor practices that the tech companies have, that they have employees, but they also rely on vast amounts of contractors that don't have the same rights.

and, you know, do do some fairly hard work and don't share in the same upside that employees do. And in fact, Google, where you used to work is one of the companies that's been criticized as having the large contractor workforce that doesn't get to share in the upside when the company thrives. Another company, two other companies actually that help fund you, Uber and Lyft, fought extremely hard against having the people that use their technology be labeled as employees and not users. they ended up winning that fight. They're still labeled as users. And, you know, there's a long debate about that. But it does seem like, you know, there's, there's, we've talked about this on the podcast before, but I just want to bring it back up again. There is a segment of the tech industry that says they're, you know, all four progressive values and inclusivity, but still works really hard, you know, to maintain a winners and losers society where a handful of the people that are responsible for the wealth generation.

of their companies, win big, and then large numbers of people, whether that's the people that are sifting through the images that have been flagged on Facebook, the people helping to prop up Google, the drivers that are working for Uber and Lyft, don't get to participate in that. So is that really progressive to, you know, stand with them on a, on this policy front? And, you know, do you see any need for a reshaping of the way that employees, you know, view the fellow people that are doing the work with them? Sure. Well, the first thing I would say is, you know, having worked at a company, companies are not perfect. They screw up. They have blind spots. I think, and, you know, I think the best companies are responsive to public criticism and frankly responsive to employee criticism. I think one of the things you, you know, you've written about and see across the tech industry is a lot of companies grappling with this question of, you know, employee concerns and demands and how do they create an environment,

how do companies leaders create an environment where employees feel like they can help make the company better. I don't know that, I mean, so for example, if you look at, you know, Valley companies, when the Penn, I think pre-pendemic actually, Facebook did something interesting. They had actually already, their shuttle bus drivers had already unionized. And early in the pandemic, they worked out an agreement with their shuttle bus drivers union to continue paying drivers through the pandemic, even though they weren't driving. And that became then the agreement that essentially became the norm at the other companies in terms of their own deal agreements with drivers. A lot of that, by the way, is driven by employees. And so I think I'm not sure it's as black and white as you suggest.

I think actually what I saw when I was working in company. You're right. Maybe it is the people that are sitting in the chairs that you've sat in. Maybe it's the policy people that are the problem. Well, I don't know the policy people are the problem. I just think that in my experience, many of the employees of Valley companies are actually pretty, um, pretty sensitized to the imperative of, of fair treatment of contractors. Yeah.

And actually, when they've spoken up about it, um, such as in another one of your member companies inside Amazon, they've been fired. I mean, the people that spoke up about worker conditions inside Amazon, you know, as coronavirus set in, ended up getting fired from the company. So do you think that that, do you think that was the right way to handle this? Yeah, and I don't know. I know. I don't claim to speak for every company's decision on every single thing.

But I do. Well, of course, of course, but I'm curious, like, you know, from your perspective personally, Do you think that, you know, if employees are driving the change, should the companies that we're talking about here do a better job listening and not? Yeah. And obviously, complicated employment situation, but does it seem like the right way to handle this stuff is to fire the whistleblowers? Well, I think that, you know, if you take a step back, and again, you see this a lot, I think one of the things you see is all companies kind of grappling with this question of, of employees. employee activism and what role it should play, right? On one end, you, you know, you have companies like Coinbase and Basecamp, right,

who sort of declared, you know, no politics at work, right? And we're just going to focus on building our product. And on the other hand, you have, you know, someone like Mark Benioff, right, maybe the opposite of the spectrum who personally weighs in on a lot of social economic issues. I would say actually the vast majority of companies in my experience are somewhere in the middle. And they, I think most company leaders actually, you know, value employees speaking up on different topics. That doesn't mean they're always going to agree. But I see most companies kind of grappling with this question of how do we respond to some of these concerns. And, you know,

there have been, there have been a number of people, Roy Bahaat, who's a member of our volunteer advisory board who have spoken up about kind of new structures of the show yeah new structures for for companies to bring in worker voices uh into decision making and i think there's a lot of interesting ideas there yeah but but i want to go back i don't want to let this go just yet because i do want to go back to the way that the companies that are part of your group have have handled or help fund that your group have handled this stuff um again amazon fired the people who spoke up for worker conditions. And they ended up leading to a resignation of like one of their top people at AWS. He just couldn't handle it. And he said, you know, something like I can't, I won't

continue to serve this poison. And even Google. And look, I know that the, it's not black and white when it comes to work or have a C inside organizations. But listen, if you have Amazon, obviously has clear problems with the way that it treats the warehouse workers, firing whistleblowers when they speak up on behalf of these folks. And then you have Google company you used to work with. I mean, they've systematically pushed out, you know, almost everybody involved in the worker movement. You know, back then, it does seem to me that, you know, I mean, maybe this is a role you can play is going back to these companies and say, hey, listen, you know, we're pushing for you on the front, on the progressive front. Maybe we shouldn't be canning the people

who are speaking up for, you know, the folks who are being left out of the system. Is that a role you can play? I think it's something that's happening candidly already. I mean, I think even for example, if you look at, you know, Jeff Bezos' comments about, look, you know, we have to treat our team members better, right? And Amazon already has a pretty good compensation. They pay benefits to warehouse employees from the very beginning. But, you know, they're saying they can do better.

And I think, honestly, I wouldn't be surprised. if you see the same thing happening across the industry. Yeah, and this is the issue is that oftentimes, I mean, you look at tech executives saying that we can do better. I'll just point you to Mark Zuckerberg. I mean, we have heard for years about, you know, the need to do better and build trust and all that. And then the action is oftentimes lacking when it comes to actually doing stuff.

Now, look, I will, I have in the past and we'll continue to give Amazon some credit. They are way ahead of the federal government when it comes to where the minimum wage $7.25 minimum wage. On the federal level, $15 minimum wage in the Amazon warehouses. So they get some kudos for that. But also, I find it somewhat funny that now, you know, these companies are, you know, starting to say that they're, and again, not registered to a party, but I do find it funny and politically expedient in some ways that these companies are now, you know, grabbing onto this progressive movement. and saying they're part of it, while also being clearly lacking and firing the people who have

been speaking up on these values for a long time. Maybe that's just me. Well, yeah, as I said, I would not be surprised, I think, if you see continued evolution on the part of companies on this front. Candidly, I also think one of the things going to happen is that because the remote workforce, much more of their workforce is going to be remote, it's going to be in different places. I think treatment of employees is it has to be at the top of the list. Otherwise, companies turnover is going to be too high, right? And it's a competitive economy out there. So I think that the companies have an interest in making improvements.

And candidly, this kind of criticism is good for industry to hear, my experience. Yeah. And again, I'll just point out not just employees, but contractors need to be part of that. situation as well. In my opinion. Okay, let's take a quick break after the break. I want to talk a little bit about the way that organizations like yours play into the public conversation, how your statements end up getting included in press reports and interpreted and what that all means. So let's take a break. We'll be right back here on the big technology podcast. Stick with us just about a 60 second break and we'll be back.

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like the one you're using right now. And we're back here for the second half of the big technology. podcast with Adam Kovacovic. Did I get that right? Kavakovich. Close though. So close. I've heard it all.

Thank you for being with us. You are the head of the Chamber of Progress. Again, we've been speaking about a very interesting organization funded by, let's just read who you're funded by. Amazon, automatic, door dash, Facebook get around, Google, Grubhubhub, Instacart, Lyme, Lyft, Neuro, Twitter, Uber, Waymo Wing, and Z. what are what are those companies getting for their money well we're an industry trade association and so um you know we're not a public interest group we're not a think tank um and i felt it was

really important to be upfront about you know who are the companies that are supporting our group i'm giving you credit because yeah you at least list them on the homepage totally which is something that isn't done all over the place there's a lot of groups that are active in the policy space that don't. And I, then the first question is, well, who's supporting you? And we're 100% supported by funding from these companies and are not trying, you know, and want to be 100% supportive of that. So, so we're, you know, we're advocating for industry's interests. There's, that's what an association's do. And, you know, I think that doesn't mean we always agree. I think one of the things that we've set up as a principle is we don't, our partner companies, we don't,

claim to speak for individual partner companies. We also have a set of principles that we're committed to even when partner companies disagree. And no company has a vote or a veto over our policies. So it means that, you know, we have and we'll say things that not every company agrees with. And that's okay. That's why we're super explicit about that principle. So I've given you some credit, but now I also want to like talk about the other side of this, which is that the concern is that this is, you know, yet another organization with an ambiguous name that's making big tech's case for it. And I've written in the past about another organization called the Progressive Policy Institute that I think is far more opaque. But you end up reading, you know, the stories that come

out about these tech companies. And you see, you know, the people who are saying that there should be stronger antitrust enforcement on one side. You really actually hear from the companies themselves. you hear from companies like you hear from organizations like like yours or the progressive policy institute and it does seem like okay there's like balanced advocacy organizations on both side what's often left out though is the fact that big tech you know in the stories at least is the fact that big tech does does support these groups so why can't big tech make its case on antitrust on its own i mean i spoke with a senator a state senator from new york mike Janaris, who had the Progressive Policy Institute at one of his hearings, where I think all five

of the big tech companies had declined to appear, but a representative from PPI shows out. PPI has taken funding from a number of these companies. And the point Gineris makes is big tech should, you know, if big tech believes that it's in the right, it should just make this, you know, argument on its own. So I guess, you know, we're in the middle of this period where we're seeing legislation introduced in Congress, a stronger FTC, and arguments being made that some of the excesses of these companies, like I know you mentioned that some people say they should be dissolved. I think the broader argument is that some of the excesses of these companies should be reined in.

Why do we need these third-party organizations that seem to show that there's more support for these companies than there really is that are funded by these companies? Why do we need them to be out there making the argument? why can't the company's on their own do the same? Sure. Well, first of all, you know, I think all the things you describe are contribute to the reason why I say explicitly. You know, we are an industry group. Here's our supporting partners.

We're not trying to deceive anybody about who our funders are or what our interests are. Why don't companies speak up on their own behalf? I don't know. You know, I think sometimes, I think sometimes one tech in particular faces a lot of policy threats, not just federally, state and locally, and sometimes it might be a volume question. I wouldn't be surprised if sometimes companies feel. How could it be a, I mean, a volume question. These are a trillion-dollar companies. Sorry, not volume.

Not volume in terms of like how loudly they can speak. But, you know, I think, for example, this. We just ended at the state legislative session, right? Most state legislatures had, and there were hundreds of bills that are proposed in state legislatures that, you know, would affect tech. Most tech companies don't have, you know, a Minnesota lobbyist and a Montana lobbyist, right? But there are trade organizations who work on behalf of industry collectively who have the ability to monitor legislation in those states. And so sometimes what happens is, you know, the industry representative says, here's, here's what the effect on industry would be just because, again, of the volume of the tax. I wouldn't be surprised that as you see companies, as you see proposals advance, I think companies tend to speak up more, the more serious the proposal is, candidly.

When I was at Google, I was involved in work around the, this SOPA PIPA legislation. and Google was among several companies that did basically a home page promotion. It wasn't a blackout. There are some sites that did a blackout day. Like when you think about this new package of antitrust bills, I mean, this is like part of the reason why I thought it would be great to have a conversation with you is they've been largely silent, but you've been very loud. I've seen your name everywhere.

And so yeah, I do wonder, okay, this seems like it's raised to the level of a, of, of, seriousness, there's five bills that have been introduced in the House of Representatives. And I do wonder, you know, if organizations like yours, CCIA, Progressive Policy Institute, you know, all dropping quotes and making the case, showing up at hearings, making the case that, you know, big tech is being unfairly targeted or that the legislation is off, whether that shows, you know, creates an illusion that there's actually more support for them than there actually is A and B, you know, sort of paints them as being com cool and collected above the fray while sending out others to, you know, and so not defensive while sending out others to

defend them. Yeah, I can't, again, I can't speak to their motives. And as I said, I actually think that probably companies will speak up if they feel the threat is serious enough to influence their customers, right, and the products that they offer. So I wouldn't be surprised if you see that happening as some of these proposals advance. You know, look, I think that I can only speak for our organization. We try to be clear about who are, you know, who are supporting companies are. We are an industry group and, you know, and try to be upfront about that. And then hopefully make arguments that people either feel or valid argument.

or some of some policymakers might reject those arguments. So, you know, so I think that's kind of how I would, how we approach it as an organization. Yeah. So transparency is important to you. Yes. So I have some questions on that front. Will you guys list a report maybe annually of who funds you and the dollar amounts that they're giving?

We'll do with it. We already do what more than most associations do and list who are partner companies. We won't list annual. We won't list individual amounts, but we'll file the 990 reports that are required every year that that lists where funding comes from. What is a 990 report? It's an IRS form that all nonprofits have to file every year that includes all of that information. Why not list the individual donations of transparency as part of one of the core values here?

Well, I just think we've said that we're going to be transparent on more transparent than most groups and listing partners. I don't know that there are any that do. Some companies actually choose to list how much they fund. But yeah, I mean, we're also not inviting, you know, journalists into our meetings, right? I mean, transparency always has some limits. Okay. Yeah, I do find it sort of sad that the bar is so low that simply disclosing funders is doing better. But I suppose that's not your issue.

But it does sort of speak to the swampy nature of a lot of this stuff. Yeah. So, all right, we'll be able to see some transparency, not all of it on that. I have another question. When you speak with journalists, will you insist that there's going to be a disclosure when they quote you about where the money is coming from? We have it in our press releases. We have it on the press on the press. Again, I think that almost every time I'm quoted somewhere, it actually reporters will say, you know, this is a group that's supported by. these companies so yeah i've seen i've i've looked through some of the quotes some but not all um and maybe that's something okay like i'm not going to be someone who stands up here and says reporters are perfect um maybe that's something reporters need to be better on is as is you know showing uh adding adding disclosures like this.

So, and then when you write upeds, so Alex Stapp, who was at, who's at the Progressive Policy Institute, he wrote this op-ed for the MIT Tech Review about how like all these ideas about antitrust with Big Tech are like totally off. And then, you know, eventually they never disclosed that PPI is funded in part by the big tech companies and they had to like do a correction and put that disclosure on the bottom. So when you write op-eds, is that something that you'll disclose? Yep, absolutely. It's something, as I said, we have it on our website.

I think it's an important principle. Yeah. What do you think about the practice? It's called Grass tops I've written about in the past, where trade organizations will recruit small businesses to say, you know, these regulations will harm small businesses. And you end up getting like, you know, these very wonky op-ed. that show up at like there was one uh in the kansas city star that was attacking josh holly for instance

for his um for his anti-tech approach and then you go to the small business owner you know it's and i'm not saying a hundred percent is what happened this case in particular because i don't have it in front of me but you go to the small business owner and you say all right well it was this this draft was actually written by a organization that big tech funds no disclosure at all uh in the op-ed um do you you think that your organization will engage in this practice? Or, you know, can you state that, you know, if you do recruit smaller businesses to help make big techs arguments for them, that they will, that they'll disclose that there was support that came from your organization. Or are you going to swear the practice off completely? I don't, it's not something, it's not an activity we're

planning on doing. But no, I think in our advocacy activity, one of the things we, we have been very careful about is saying, yes, we're, we're, we're a chamber of progress. We're, an industry organization and here are the companies that support our work. Yeah. Now, okay, I want to go back to one other thing that you said before. You said you think that the companies will end up speaking up on their own. Okay, that's good, but I still, you know, we even started this conversation talking about how the views, some of the views, I think you mentioned this, that some of the views that you're advancing are views that belong to a very good chunk of members of Congress anyway, you know, that they don't want to totally crush. tech that they want to maybe rein them in to some extent but you know not not in the way that

some of these bills out there are saying it so um you know even if is it anything outside of volume i mean do you see that like you know potentially the benefit to big tech of having you guys out there you know taking some of the flack on on their behalf well i don't know i think i think a lot of it is about um talking about what we perceive as the impact of some of these things. So, for example, you know, one of the proposals that we've been speaking up about is this proposal from Congressman Cicillini, and actually another related proposal from Congresswoman Jayapal that would target what they call discrimination or conflicts of interest. And what it is, if you look at the legislation, Congressman Cicillini's legislation

would ban the kind of product integration, right, that allows your iPhone to come with iMessage and FaceTime, that allows Facebook to come with Messenger, that allows Amazon to come with Amazon Prime. There's been some debate on that. Well, I don't actually think there has been. I don't think the bill, the bill, I mean, there was a, I think, there was, Congressman Susslini was, I think,

splitting some hairs about a separate provision of his bill. But he acknowledged in an interview this week that the bill would ban Amazon Prime products. our Amazon basics products. So that's a goal of the legislation. The thing that I was point to under debate was that in terms of installing the apps on iPhone products, they could come pre-installed. You just have to be able to delete them. I don't think that's true, actually.

I mean, the legislation bans a covers, yeah. It bans a covered service, including Apple, from advantaging its products. Right. And pre-installation would advantage a product. But by the way, no, the easy response is if Congressman Cicillini did not intend to prevent iPhone from banning iMessage and FaceTime, he could say, let's amend the bill to make that clear. Yeah. Yeah. No, I hear you.

Look, this is going to be a process that ends up going through a number of revisions, I imagine. Sure. And that's into what I said earlier. A cool part of democracy. Yeah, and into your question about members of Congress, like I just, most members of of Congress aren't paying attention to tech policy proposals, right? They have other priorities. And part of what we've been trying to say is like,

here's what this would mean for your constituents who probably aren't paying that much attention to politics. If they like their Amazon Prime, like this bill would probably ban that from happening. And so, you know, I think that this is a pretty good example of like a proposal that would have an impact on people's lives. Now, they might say, yeah, okay, I'm okay with banning Amazon Prime. but at least at least surface the impacts of these kinds of these kind of proposals how do you think amazon benefits from having you make that argument though and having amazon sort of sit out of this

well i'm sure amazon benefits but i also think like amazon's uh customers have a stake in this too right i know i know but let's let's go back to the question though like how does amazon benefit well amazon sure amazon wants to be able to offer amazon prime and no no i i in particular i mean i'm talking about the organization that you know the chamber progress how do they benefit from having you you make that argument versus they themselves yeah i mean i think part of right so so part of what an organization they're not very they're not very good at this i mean they've they've uh gone to war with politicians and ended up uh yeah looking extremely stupid on on twitter which is again place part part part of part of what an organization like ours is able to do say okay like let's look

at this legislation and let's look at the impacts across the board so we can talk about the impacts on amazon prime on iMessage on face time on google search on messenger across the board and that's obviously you know each company could certainly and may certainly talk more about the impact on their own products but but that's something we can do yeah and you're also i would say maybe it's money well spent for these companies because you guys can mess up and it's not going to be bernie sanders coming down on like the head of retail at amazon you know it'll it'll be it'll be they have a bit of a shield, whereas, like, you can go and make the arguments a big tech to the, to the congresspeople that are going to be voting on this and, you know, essentially not have

some of the downstream risks that Amazon itself would if it did it on its own, which is I imagine why they're funding you guys. Look, I, I, you have to ask them why they're supporting our work. I know, like I said, I think, you know, again, we're an industry group. So clearly, like all these proposals have implications for industry. By the way, one of the other things that is true is that many of the provisions of these bills were lobbied for by the big company's smaller competitors as well. Right. And so I think one of the things that does happen in policy debates is that sometimes consumer interests get lost because you have company, companies are well represented by lobbyists, right? And I'm a company representative, right? I'm one of them. But I also think that,

you know, each company also has both an interest in trying to protect its own products, but also an interest in trying to make sure that their customers continue to have good experience. No one, I mean, no one wants to be able to, wants to have to tell their customers at the government, you know, Amazon doesn't want to tell us customers that the government banned prime. That's, that would be terrible, right? Of course. Yeah, this is going to go to another question I want to ask you, which is do you think that your organization could exist? Like, do you take any public money, like, from people? And do you think your organization could exist without the money from big tech?

Because if it is in the interest of, you know, the people that ultimately are going to be impacted by these changes anymore, you'd think you'd be able to rally some support from, you know, everyday citizens to help fund it versus the tech companies. Yeah. I mean, look, we, we, I chose for us to structure the organization as a 501 C6, non, uh, portraying Trade Association, funded by companies. There are other organizations that are funded by individual donations or public interest groups that are funded by foundations, a lot of foundation. You know, foundation money ultimately comes from companies as well, typically, right, corporate profits.

So I, what I would say- Or billionaires. Yeah, or billionaires or billionaires, but those billionaires made their money somehow. One of the things I would say about this is that the companies have pretty happy customers, right? They have some of the highest approval ratings of any companies, right? And so there is, I think, a pretty valid argument. They know their customers well, right? They're succeeding and delighting their customers.

And so, look, Amazon, Google, Apple have higher approval writings than most policymakers, right? And so I think there is something that, you know, to, it's an imperfect proxy, but there is definitely a dynamic to their advocacy and our advocacy, which is sort of speaking up on behalf of their own customers. Yeah. And the question is, at what cost do these positive experiences come? That is the question. That is the question. And that's, you know, even though they have these high approval ratings, which I was going to bring up.

Yep. Way higher than Congress, higher than journalists, for sure. There's still stuff. There's negative externalities. I appreciate that. Please vote in the next poll. There's negative expectations. I like most journalists.

Well, it means, well, anyway, I won't go into it. But anyway, there's, they're negative externalities that need to be. Yeah, I think, look, there's, there's no doubt about that. That's why we have government. Absolutely. And so, for example, like, some of these proposals would give an advantage to someone like Spotify, right, who's fighting with Apple over the terms of the app store. And policymakers could say, you know what? We want to give an advantage to Spotify, but that might be at odds with the integrated experience, right, of the iPhone coming with Apple music.

Oh, now you're really getting at a third rail of this show here, because I think that Apple has, you know, obviously makes great devices, but has done serious harm to the consumer experience once you're inside them by doing whatever it can to shut out competitors. And this is harming not only, you know, the competitors, but Apple as well. And, you know, you look at, for instance, and this is a whole other debate, but you look at the HomePod, which just had to basically stop producing, the Apple had to stop producing because they were so insistent, for instance, that you use Apple music and not Spotify while, like, the Echo and Google Home are thriving. But anyway, that's a whole different show. So let's leave that. But, yeah, I hear what you're saying. And that's why I'm just like, you know, if people are, you know, if, I don't know, maybe I see the point in raising the corporate money. I also wonder if people, everyday people were, you know, going to be passionate about this and believe that they had a lot to gain, you know, maybe.

We'll see. That's the thing about the, yeah, that's the thing about what we'll see about the political process. But it's telling that, yeah, that the way that you set up the organization was going to be a trade organization versus public interest group. Yeah. By the way, I have great respect. There's lots of public interest groups working on these topics and have great respect for them. Yeah. Great. Well, Adam, look, you know, I told you wasn't going to be an easy interview. No, but that's great. I think that there's obvious, you know, I'll just say this. I think that the point of my newsletter, the point of this show is to show what's going on behind the scenes and cue people into. the way this stuff works and um you know i i i think that like there are people who told me oh don't give adam the floor um personally uh i give you credit for coming on um and this has been

fun it's been fun and look if listeners to this to this episode can get a sense of the way that the politics behind the scenes work uh when it comes to big tech antitrust i think that's a good And I agree. You know, my positions on this stuff, I'm still trying to figure out what the legislation means. You know, I know I just wrote a story yesterday. You wrote a great piece about the M&A, the MNA implications. We talked about how one of the bill was particularly misguided. I think, you know, obviously, the tech giants brought this on themselves.

They've been anti-competitive in a lot of different ways that's given Congress the ammunition it needs to start writing bills to try to rein them in. So it'll be an interesting process. Clearly, you're going to play a role. You've got the donors to keep you going for a while, I imagine. And so hopefully after today, people will have an idea of what's happening behind the scenes. I appreciate you joining. Thanks, Alex. Great.

Thanks for having me. Thank you, Adam. Thanks, everybody for listening. We will be back next week with a fun interview. It's going to be with the CEO of Tinder, Jim Lanzone. So that will be an interesting one. I'm about to go and record that. If it's your first time listening, please subscribe.

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