Pivot - AT&T's TimeWarner/Discovery+ super merger and GLAAD's report on social media platforms

Episode Date: May 18, 2021

Kara and Scott talk about AT&T spinning off their streaming service Time Warner and combining it with Discovery+ to compete with streaming content giants. They also discuss Twitter's potential new subscription service "Twitter Blue" (ya heard it here first!) Then we're joined by GLAAD president Sarah Kate Ellis to discuss the organization's new report that looks at safety for the LGBTQ community across social media. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Pick up my son at college and bring him home from NYU. What's going on? And like drama all over the place. Mergers, drama, Bill Gates, everything. Like all over the place. Elon Musk hating on Bitcoin, etc. All right. Let's start with Bill Gates. We have to talk about this. The New York Times published an article making allegations that Microsoft founder made many unwanted advances on employees over the years. The Wall Street Journal reported that Bill Gates' 2020 resignation from Microsoft's board of directors came after the board hired a law firm to investigate a romantic relationship, an inappropriate one he had with a Microsoft employee.

inappropriate one he had with a Microsoft employee. Another, I guess it was Daily Beast, said he hung out with Jeffrey Epstein and got marriage advice from him, which I'm not sure about that one, but he did hang out with him more than he said, and it was an issue of contention. And then Bill Gates's money manager was involved in a sexual harassment issue with a person at a bike store. I don't even understand it, but Melinda was not happy about how that was handled, plus the Epstein thing, which led to the divorce, which is where we are, which is where she would be one of the richest women in the world. Anyway, so what up? What up, Scott? I think you were surprised.

Yeah, actually, I was really shocked by it, to be honest. You know what, Kara? I only know what's in the news, and you know these people on a personal level i i'd just be curious you just you you just have more authority to speak to this issue than i do i don't know them you know there were rumors that they had an unhappy marriage but like there's lots of rumors about people right i don't it's not what i cover so and you know he had a pretty i mean everyone sort of knew Microsoft. And it's been chronicled, and there were several real problems with people there. They had a lot of partying in the early days.

And, you know, there was a whole report about strippers in the early days. He was a single guy. I don't know what to say, but they had a wild, they had some wild times there early on. I think the more problematic things is this report came in the middle of, or the woman he had an affair with wrote a letter to the board, and it was right in the middle of the Me Too stuff. And so the board was trying to figure out what to do in that situation, and the woman wanted his wife, Melinda French Gates, to read it. You know, I think when these things surfaced, and there were not just Gates, there were a whole bunch of CEOs. You know, I think when these things surfaced, and there were not just Gates, there were a whole bunch of CEOs. If you remember, there was a series of CEOs who had affairs at work. I can't remember all of them, but there were a couple and they had to step down, right, at that time, because it what happened there in the Wall Street Journal one. And then the one on Epstein, I don't know if he went there too much, or as you know, you said that, you know, it looks like he had a much more significant relationship. I do not, that says nothing about anything else. He just hung out with him. And then the Times one was essentially someone awkwardly making a series of date requests at work and not one,

like he met his wife at work. So that's fine. I mean, that happens all the time too. And he married her and lots of people meet at work and go out and that's, you know, sometimes problematic, sometimes not. But in this case, it looks like he made a bunch of them, like a lot more sort of saw work as a dating pool, I guess, in some fashion. So I think it was the number of them. And so, you know, I don't know. I think this is not good. It's disappointing. It's at the same time until I see more.

You know what I mean? I'm sort of waiting to see more. They had an unhappy marriage, I think, and he was trying to get some date people, I guess, on the side or something. Again, I don't know the inside of anyone's marriage, so I don't know what that was personally. But, you know, it's gotten him to a mess of trouble when he's trying to actually put out some really interesting stuff about climate change, et cetera. So it's a real black eye for him, I suspect. Yeah. As you point out, I was really shocked when I read this.

Yeah, as you pointed out, I was really shocked when I read this. What is more troubling is that, and I always go to what's the learning here if you're a younger person in a company? And the learning is if you're a 20 or 30 year old, you know, 30 something and you meet someone and you want to establish a relationship and there's even some risks in that. But when people are spent, we're asking people to spend so much time at work, young people are supposed to meet, fall in love, and mate. And that's going to happen at work. And I'm going to a wedding this summer of two people who met at work. And so I don't, that's going to happen. And that's what happened with them. What is not acceptable, especially in this age, once you get to a certain level of power and influence in a company, your fly needs to be up and locked at work. Well, he's a public company CEO of a massive company.

That's my point. He became the wealthiest man in the world based off the stock of the company that he founded and then he was on the board of. And, boss, if you're the wealthiest man in the world, it not only gives you the obligation, but quite frankly, it gives you the opportunity to take that shit off campus. It's just, that's just not the sandbox. Yeah, I think it was interesting. You know, he travels all over the world. I was surprised he didn't meet people elsewhere. Exactly.

And then the other thing is that made me, that I thought about this, that there's a positive. I think that this is an example of how strong Microsoft's board is. Yeah. I think the board did the right thing. They kicked them off. I mean, can you imagine how easy it would have been

for them to make all sorts of excuses for Bill Gates? They do have a strong board. They do. And this is the difference between Microsoft's board and Tesla's board. That's a good point. Their CEO engages in massive market manipulation and they're like, well,

Elon's going to be Elon. And then Bill Gates, arguably the most iconic figure in the history technology, who's made a ton of money for everyone sitting around that table, he does this and they say, sorry, boss, this reflects really poorly on you and on us. You're out. And I think it really speaks to the character and good corporate governance. But it's easy to judge people personally. I don't think we should do that. But you get to a certain level in a company where you garner that kind of wealth, that kind of authority, it reeks of an abuse of power, and it just reeks of just terrible judgment. Well, it's interesting. They have John Thompson on the board.

He's a long time. He's been there a long time. He's the chair. He became the chair during this i think during the situation they've got a penny pretzger who was you know was it was a commerce secretary um yeah it's commerce secretary and she's obviously a very wealthy um private investor um you know they've got a really interesting board and at one point reed hastings was on the board. They have Padmasree Warrior, who was another top tech executive at Cisco and CTO of Cisco. And is now working on all kinds of stuff.

So it's an interesting, it's definitely an interesting board, a very strong board. And you're right, they did act. I don't say that there's women on it, but there's the CEO of GlaxoSmithKline, obviously probably close to Gates because of a lot of the medical stuff he does with his foundation and stuff. So, yeah. And then there's Satya Nadella, of course, who's, I think he's, I'm not sure he's on the board. Is he on the board? Yeah, he's on the board.

He's the CEO. Yeah, yeah. So, it's just, it's a really interesting situation for sure. I mean, and I think they acted correctly. They investigated it, looked like, you know, without fear or favor, and then decided it was problematic and said so. So there you have it. Yeah, I just, and the other thing I thought about, wow, someone is very angry at Bill Gates. And someone is leaking all of this, leaking these letters, leaking these inside

baseball. And I don't think it's anyone on the board because they had a couple of years to leak it. And I don't know if it's the woman he was having the relationship with, the obvious pick here, but nobody knows, is his soon-to-be ex-wife. But somebody is very angry at Bill Gates. Well, it looks like it's not going to be a particularly cooperative divorce, as, say, the Bezos one was, even though Bezos essentially left his wife for another woman, too, whom he met outside of work. But he, you know, that was sort of a very cooperative one. And I just wanted to finish that.

I think there's a big distinction there that I think there's a big distinction there. I think there's a big distinction. I think that the really disappointing or the real what I would call professional lack of judgment here was doing it at work. I mean, I just like he's such a smart guy. He is. And in a lot of ways, it's kind of tragic because this is an individual who's literally trying to cure malaria. I mean, could save the lives of millions of people. Yeah. And to, on a risk-adjusted basis, take these kinds of risks when, quite frankly, whatever he was

looking for was probably available elsewhere at a much less collateral damage. It's just like, this isn't the kind of guy you would think that would make this sort of risk-adjusted, self-inflicted error. Well, he's an awkward social person. I mean, that's not an excuse by any means for him. I mean, I've heard he's flirted with different people, and it's awkward. I've never heard anyone say it was menacing or anything, but still in the workplace, it's unwelcome to do it multiple, multiple times. And again, my guess is he met his wife there he's like oh that's where you meet your you know i think in his head that's that's how he thinks and she was a very high level executive at microsoft not high

high but you know she was in the she was in the group not there weren't that many women are you talking about his wife or the woman he had his wife and his wife he met his wife there so maybe in his head i I don't know. I'm not making excuses for Bill Gates. This is a bad look. This is a bad, bad, bad look for him. And again, we haven't gotten along that well over the years. But it's both.

I thought the Board acted. I think that's the best way to take away. The Board acted correctly and seemed to have tried to take care of it. You know, people will complain that they didn't say anything publicly, which, you know, billionaires get a pass here, but I think in this case, probably handle it. I don't think so. I think letting him, I mean, letting it be his idea,

maintaining the integrity of the company, maintaining his ability to do the good work he's doing, not embarrassing him, his wife, and his family. Yeah. I think they did the right thing, quite frankly, in not making it a public disclosure. You forget these companies. There's so much emotion at work.

There's so much emotion at work. Anyway, this was a sad story. This is a really sad story. And he really had bad judgment. I think that's pretty much it. Speaking of bad judgment, Elon tweeted that he would not be creating his own cryptocurrency unless Dogecoin is unable to make changes about sustainability practices. So, you know, it's kind of a why I oughta. Like, he's been doing all these anti-Bitcoin stuff.

Please, tell me what's going on here, Scott. There's never been anything like it. I think the clearest blue flame daily newsletter is a guy named Matt Levine from Bloomberg. This guy, every time I read something, I'm like, God, I wish I'd written that. And he's just so funny and insightful and all that prolific. Him and Ben Thompson, I just, these guys, their brain is just most, I can't imagine they sleep. But he had the right take. And that is what would an investor, Warren Buffett or JP Morgan, pay for a little bottle? And you rub it, and a genie comes out and says, here's an asset, and you can buy as much as you want,

and then you can say something and take it up 10% and sell, and then say something else and take it down 10% and buy, and then wash, rinse, and repeat. What would you pay for that? And that's what Elon Musk has now. He has a liquid $60 billion in Dogecoin, $2 trillion in Bitcoin asset that he can take up or down 5% to 10% based on a tweet. Yeah, it's interesting. You know what's interesting? Let me just go through it. This is from a CNN article.

So a user named Cryptowale, that guy, tweeted, Bitcoiners are going to slap themselves next quarter when they find out Tesla dumped the rest of their Bitcoin holdings. With the amount of hate Elon Musk is getting, I wouldn't blame him. And Musk replied an hour later, indeed, which of writing, to clarify speculation, Tesla has not sold any Bitcoin, which you had suggested the other day. Um, and, but it still went down, um, uh, to 40, 42,000. It was way up at 60. Um, and so he really is causing all kinds of gyrations here, um, which in an area that's not regulated, of course, at the same time. But he is a public company CEO with ownership of some of this stuff. So it really starts to get problematic here. I'd love to know the behind the scenes here. Why did he start doing it? And then he did his Twitter poll, a Tesla to accept Dogecoin, which he did too. So I don't get it. He's launching a coin. He put out a tweet the other day saying, we wouldn't do it unless Dogecoin didn't improve, which I read is coming soon to a theater near you, the Tesla coin. And I just, the guy has so much, I mean, he's clearly a genius, right? He clearly might, he already has probably put a dent or created momentum around the electrification of internal combustion engines. He could put a man or woman or just people on Mars, which is very exciting. And this at a minimum

is just a weird distraction. And you know what a board member is supposed to do? A board member, every once in a while, is supposed to call the CEO and say, what the actual fuck?

Maybe something happened here because he was into Dogecoin and then he wasn't. I want to know what happened. I want a great reporter like Matt or someone else to come tell me what happened there. Yeah. Tell me what happened. Who has a great reporter like Matt or someone else to come tell me what happened there. Yeah.

Tell me what happened. Who has really good sources. That board really doesn't like to, they have a let Elon be Elon kind of attitude. It's not a board. I agree. But I'm telling you, I've spoken to a bunch of them and they're like, let Elon be. I'm like, all right. Okay.

Anyway, we have to get on to the big story. On to the big story. Speaking of let AT&T be AT&T, it's spinning off Time Warner and merging it with Discovery Plus in a new standalone company. The abrupt move will combine the reality TV streaming power, Discovery, which includes networks like the Food Network, HGTV with Time Warner's HBO Max,

Warner Brothers Studios, and CNN, in an effort to compete with heavy hitters like Netflix and Disney. Discovery CEO David Zaslav will run the combined business, which is interesting. It also, an effort for AT&T, will unwind its 2016 deal with Time Warner. The $85 billion deal included the phone company's debt. The deal took several years to gain approval. It battled the Trump administration, if you recall that, the announcement. After all that, said this week it would receive $43 billion in combination cash

debts and securities. And the company will still start with $55 billion in debt. I just don't... You know what it says? John Sankey is a shitty strategist, media strategist for this company. I don't know what to say.

Especially, I like David Zasloff, but again, he's an old media type personality. What do you think, Scott? You must have a lot to say here. Yeah. So, look, the most expensive trip ever taken was Verizon and AT&T's trip from New Jersey and Dallas to Los Angeles. Yeah, to go to the Oscars. Yeah.

Verizon leaves $5 billion less rich. They went, they bought Yahoo AOL, Tim Armstrong sold it for 10 billion. It's worth 5 billion just a couple years later. Yeah, which you think is worth more, but go ahead, yep. Fourth most trafficked in Earth's site. Anyways, and then AT&T, it wasn't 85 with the data, it was more like 110 or 120. It makes Jeff Bugis look like a genius.

He sold at the top. And then the company, they get supposedly $44 billion in debt relief from the new entity, or they're taking $44 billion. So that's okay, $44 billion. And they're going to own 71% of the new company, which to make this a wash, that means the new entity would have to be worth $100 billion in equity, which it will not be. So this also looks like it's going to be something that acknowledges the valuation has been cut in half. Now, having said that, a step back when you're on the wrong path is a step in the right direction. And to Stankey's

credit, he said, this isn't working. And how do we have some sort of peace with honor here and make this mistake or the exit wounds as least damaging as possible, putting it into a spin, an independent unit, and then to bulk up with discovery is the right move because it creates arguably the third or fourth player. The consolidation is happening. This will be a company with $20 billion in original content budget. It will be a dramatic I don't know how that synergy is going to work together. I don't know if Don Lemon's going to be naked and afraid or Anderson Cooper is going to be hosting Shark Week. I don't know how these things play together. But Zaslav's challenge is he's going to do what very few traditional media executives other than Bob Iger have been given license to do. And then he's going to have to walk through the valley of death and make such

extraordinary investments and take his EBITDA down in order to move people from analog cable where they don't have access to consumer data to streaming where they have access to it and hope that the market, similar to what they've done with Disney,

tolerate that decline in EBITDA because they see the great world of streaming. But this was strategically, in my view, a very, very smart move. I was trying to think.

Now, one of the things, obviously, Twitter and CNN acquisition is not going to happen, Scott, as much as you like that. Still could. Still could. I mean, okay, but what did we say? We said AT&T is going to spin this thing. Yes, we did.

And they have. Right. No, I know, but I like your Twitter-CNN thing. I like that a lot. So AT&T needed to reduce debt. They've done that. They want to get the most money they can. They're putting it into pure play because this is what happens in a conglomerate.

Yeah. They've done that. They want to get the most money they can. They're putting it into pure play because this is what happens in a conglomerate. Investors, unless they see immediate synergy, they find the shittiest business and they value the whole business at that multiple. And that's what they were doing with AT&T. And AT&T and Verizon have these amazing businesses. They do, 5G. Yeah. That's what Stanky said after lecturing us about media. And not only that, can you imagine the culture clash here? A bunch of Dallas Republicans and a bunch of New York Democrats.

Well, you know, when Richard Kleppler left, you were like, oh yeah, this, you know, he couldn't stand Stanky like in the rest of them. And he didn't want to be lectured. Listen, Stanky lectured me about media. And I was like, are you talking? He's real tall. And I was like, I can't hear you up there. Like, I don't want to listen to you.

But it was really astonishing. The lecturing that went on by these phone people about media to media people. And I know media people can be obnoxious, but literally they knew nothing about, and it was all such nonsense, the stuff they were spewing. They were on stage at Code a number of times, whether it was Randall Stevenson or Stanky. And I was always like, I kept thinking in my head, bullshit, bullshit, bullshit, like the whole time. And so, you know, maybe they'll do what the thing is. They're competing with these tech companies and Netflix, which have done a fantastic job and have tons of money for content creation.

That said, look, I'm watching, last night I watched two HBO shows, The Nevers, it's all about badass women, and Mary Easton. And Mare. Mare. She's so good. HBO still has some of that secret sauce culture.

But to throw, not to throw, but to have Plepler take his Gucci loafers and go is a real. Well, you know who's the next exit? Jason Keillor. Oh, right. Yeah. Zaslav came out on top. Yeah.

Well, someone told me, someone pretty high up said he's at one of these restaurants looking for a job right now. So, yeah. Yeah. But look, I had a different experience with John Stanky. I haven't had a lot of interaction with him, but he basically called me and said, "'What should we do?' And seemed very humble and very thoughtful and listened a lot." Yeah, and so I had a different-

Not to ladies, he's not saying. So, but look, this was, again, a mistake is bad, not acknowledging the mistake is worse. And I think this is probably, as I think about it, that a bulking up and a spin trying to get some of that multiple. No one was going to pay the money they wanted in an asset purchase. But they've already made the wrong decision. I don't mean to insult David Zasloff, but he's just not the future leader of media. It's like you put him against Ted Sarandos and

Reed Hastings, give me a break. It's like they're going to just dunk on him over and over again. Even the, you know, I don't know. I just am like, oh, God, I like him, but he's so old media. But maybe people like him. People like him. You know, what we never talk about, though, is a lot of this is dictated by your shareholder base. AT&T has a shareholder base that wants a dividend and was never going to let Stankey make the types of investments they need to make to pulse. Keep in mind, the cable bundle does three times the profit

of the streaming video companies now and has a third of the valuation. And people buy AT&T stock to get a 5% dividend. So then we're never going to let Stankey make the requisite investments he needs to make to compete with the Netflixes of the world and with the Disney Pluses of the world. They're letting him off. He should have been fired. Come on, like you make this many mistakes. See you later.

I want to be clear. He owns, you want to talk about foul balls, talk about DirecTV. They purchased that thing for like 55 billion and they basically sold it for 15. They will claim they're cleaning up Randall Stevenson's mess but Stankey was the head of strategy. He has to own this too.

So yeah, I'm not, you're right. This is, but look, a bad decision is wrong. Not fixing it is worse. They are, they have, this is a self-inflicted wound. They have taken, they're trying to like heal themselves. They had to do this. They did this from a position of weakness, quite frankly. My guess is they were shopping all these assets around and they realized we're not going to get, we're not going to get the price we wanted. So they're putting it in. And they've been very kind of cagey around valuation. I think when the numbers, when people actually get their pencils out, I think what this is

going to show is that $120 billion acquisition was turned into a $60 billion company. And so they'll take a, I think they're going to have to take a fairly substantial write down. But just in terms of the future of HBO and CNN, which I adore, I think they're going to have to take a fairly substantial write-down. But just in terms of the future of HBO and CNN, which I adore, I think they're just incredible assets. I think this gives them a chance at getting the pure play. Could be. And Zaslav, I don't know him at all. People in Hollywood love him.

He's not Jason Kailar who pissed everyone off telling them the truth. Jason was just telling them the truth and just did it in a way they didn't like to be petted. But, you know, it would be interesting to see if Jeff Zucker stays now. That's an interesting... I think he will. I think... I read he's Zaslav's friend. Oh, I bet. Oh, I bet they hang out and do cigars and brandy all the time. I could see that. Well, that's what all white guys do.

Well, honestly. That's all we do is drink brandy and smoke cigars. I just think John Stagg gets to be CEO. Like, everyone moves up and to the left after losing all this money. That's all we do. We take our posse medication and we watch football. Like, honestly. Like, losing all this money. That's all we do. We take our prostate medication and we watch football. Honestly, losing all this money, he gets to be the CEO and then goes, 5G.

Fuck you. You don't know. Anyways. I want him to come. You know what? We're having code and you and I are going to grill him if he comes. He has no guts to come. John Stanky, you have guts to take care of him. He's an alumni of UCLA. Remember I was the short girl biting your knee at the last event.

What about girls biting my knees? What are you talking about? When we were at an event, literally, he ignored me. Is this a Bill Gates party? No. What are we talking about? We were at some event, the Vanity Fair event or whatever. And Stanky and the Vandal, they're so frigging tall.

They're ridiculously, insanely tall. And I was talking to them, and they treated me like I was like, it was, it never really happens to me that much, but these two were like lecturing me on media. And I literally was like, I got to get out of here. Like I, what, who's this annoying girl? I could just see it. It doesn't usually come out quite so clearly, but I got to tell you, John come to code and me and Scott will give you, have a few questions for you. Questions. I want to go to the Vanity Fair party with you. It's just so we look like Ichabod Crane dropping his daughter off at kindergarten. Let's go.

Let's go and bother celebrities. We would be good at that. Anyway, John, you're not a nonsensical, ridiculous money loser. Come to COVID Talk. Well, that's an invitation you can't turn down. You know what? He should.

I'm going to have Hans Vestberg if he doesn't. That's what I'm going to do. I'm going to just play this. Hans Vestberg. Is that Verizon? Verizon. He took over after the last disaster. He's cleaning up that one.

Anyway. Yeah. Anyways, I'm excited to see what Zaslav does. He's got, look, he's got three or six months. He throws a good dinner party. I'll tell you that. To go gangster and really pulse the streaming and try and take. The bottom line is he needs to keep, he needs to milk the shit out of the ad business and make huge, uncomfortable investments to get a direct relationship

with consumers vis-a-vis streaming and say to the market, we are the number two, maybe even the number one if he really wants to enter conceptual hallucination. Oh, like talent up and down. Good for talent. They'll get all kinds of money in this deals. But many years ago, you know, Discovery, you may not know this started in the Washington area. Yes, I've been there, yeah. Yeah, and I did a profile when they were starting, and they were trying desperately to get on cable stations, essentially. It was a guy named John Hendricks who founded the company, and I did a little profile. I went and visited him up in, I don't know, was it Bethesda or Rockville or something like that?

I think it was Bethesda. And I wrote the single best lead I've ever written in my whole life for the Washington Post. That's a high bar. You've written a lot of genius stuff. This was my lead. It was a quote from John Hendricks. It was, sharks and Nazis, Nazis and sharks. Thank God for Nazis and sharks.

And it was because that's what made Discovery. They did endless Nazi history shows, essentially. I've watched all of them. What? I've watched all of them. They're all on Discovery. And then Shark Week. And that was the best quote I've ever gotten. I've watched all of them. What? I've watched all of them. They're all on Discovery. And then Shark Week. And that was the best quote I've ever gotten.

That's chocolate and peanut butter. Two great tastes that go great together. I'm just telling you, Nazis and sharks. Nazis, thank God for Nazis and sharks. You know what? I think Discovery has one of the best brands in media. They do. It's a fantastic brand.

They remember the Learning Channel? The Learning Channel. TLC. Yeah, I think they do. I think they do. Remember the Discovery stores? I like the idea of Naked and Afraid with Anderson Cooper. Or no, you said Don Lemon. Right? Yes. channel tlc i think remember the discovery stores naked and afraid with anderson cooper or no you said don lemon right yes would you ever go on naked and afraid i interviewed someone who

was on naked and afraid i would not cara you would not i can honestly say i would not you know we should go on return to amish they have a show called return to amish you and i could go back to the amish you're all over the place You would look good in an Amish hat. Yeah? You could pull that off. I don't think I would so much. It's a little handmaid's tale for me. Anyway, we'll take a quick break. We'll be back to talk about Twitter's new subscription service.

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Get all the automation, integration, and reporting tools that get your marketing running seamlessly, all backed by Constant Contact's expert live customer support. Ready, set, grow. Go to ConstantContact.ca and start your free trial today. Go to ConstantContact.ca for your free trial. Constantcontact.ca. Okay, Scott, we're back. Twitter is announcing its new subscription service, Twitter Blue. Oh, once finally, finally, I want you just to talk about this. I'll just give some facts.

The tiered service is rumored to cost $3 a month and is testing features that include the ability to undo tweets, charge to use a dashboard app tweet deck, and create superfalls, which would allow you to follow a creator or publisher for a monthly subscription fee and get exclusive content. Twitter has also made several new product announcements over the past several weeks, including updating its

warnings for potentially offensive tweets and rolling out tip jar feature to allow users to make donations to some creators. It's not clear yet when this new subscription would launch. They're taking their sweet time and who will be available. But, Scott, all yours. Huh. Twitter and subscription.

Well, really. Who would have thunk that? Oh, my gosh. I mean, just literally as Snap has become the product development department for Facebook, who is the strategy department for Twitter? Scott Galloway. The Vox Media Podcast Network. Scott Galloway. As the beard and his nose ring are having the sweat of some monk rubbed on the small of his back by Sean Penn as they talk about whether Uranus should be upgraded to a planet back from an asteroid, The dog is telling those shitheads what the fuck to do here.

Yeah. Now, look, have you, did you, by the way, I'm not a product guy. Is it close to what you want? What do you, what do you, is it? No, I want, it doesn't make, I don't, I, okay, now you deflated me. Now you deflated me. Okay, sorry. I just want to know what you think of the service they're talking about.

It seems confusing. I don't, I don't, I'm like, I'm not even sure I'd pay $3 for that because I don't understand what it is. I still think they should move to a pay per follower count. And rather than, I mean, they're product guys. I think of myself as a strategy kind of a guy and I have a lot of respect for product people who actually understand and do the testing and the consumer research. But I read it and I thought, would I pay $3 for that? I thought the pricing was weird. $3? $2.95 a month, I thought that was weird.

And I still think it should be zero to 10,000 or a nonprofit or zero to 100,000 free, 100,000 to a million, 10 bucks a month, above a million, it starts going like crazy, like parabolic, like a hundred or a thousand. And I think everyone will whine and say they won't pay it, and then they pay it. But look, it's a step in the right direction,

strategically it's smart, but I am direction. Strategically, it's smart. But I am sick. I have been so fooled by these people. This is about the eighth time they've launched a subscription effort. And then it kind of tomorrow never ends up being today. So we'll see. Twitter stock was $41.65 in 2013. And now it's $51.83.

It's not really. You think? What? Do you think Twitter shareholders— It was high there for a while. In February, it was up to $72, and that was as high as— Do you think Twitter shareholders want to go on Asylum Retreat with Jack Dorsey and just stare at him? Well, at least it's not $17.

Remember, it was down at $17 or whatever. Every one of their peers is up between 3 and 8x. Twitter's been an enormous disappointment. It's as if they had a part-time CEO, Kara. It's as if they had a part-time CEO. And by the way, have you seen the product innovation at Square? Yeah. Oh, my God.

Let's look at Square's stock. There's one family, and all kids are wearing like beautiful, cool clothes and in a gorgeous house and mom is happy and the dogs are well fed. And then there's another house in a fucking double wide talking about subscription. Yeah. And it's like- Square Stock has been down just the past month. What, so it's only up 1100% in the last 24 months? It was up at 245, now it's at 197.

But the max, it's been up from almost nothing, $11, $12 to now it's at 197. Yeah, so it's up 20-fold. It's up 20-fold and Twitter is down. Well, it's close to its original public offering. Yeah. Oh, God. I'm just, I can't handle this. I need to go smoke a cigar and have the bourbon as a white guy. That got you. By the way, by the way, Cara, I'm at an age where I don't need alcohol to have a good time. I need something much fucking stronger. I either need meth or something named after a woman like Molly. I am so ready for more.

By the way, oh wait, I forgot. I was on Anderson Cooper last week. Twitter's up $10 over the course of its history. Google's gone from $58 in 2004 to $2,271. That would have been a good stock to have. Even Pinterest. Even talking about soapstone kitchen counters and your favorite wedding, which you can't have because of COVID, is like tripled in the last. Yeah, let me look at Pinterest. And then there's Twitter.

And then there's Silent Retreat. Yeah, Let's see. And then there's 29 to 56. Not great. Okay. Oh, my God. Okay. Namaste, you fucking idiot. Get on it. So what do you want them to do? Let me just- What do I want them to do? Yeah. What do I want? Well, that's pretty easy. Okay. Get a full-time CEO. Oh, besides that. And go get a full-time CEO and buy with your stock a cheap media asset. Start developing vertical content. And base subscription on the actual value you're adding to someone. Base it on follower account. Take 2%, 3%, 10% of your revenue.

Be recurring. As long as it's going faster than the core business, the stock's at triple digits. It seems like a brand that you need. And then I sell my shares and stop talking about you. So you still own your shares, right? I am so sick of talking about fucking Twitter. Anyway. It seems like a brand that you need more expense. And then I sell my shares and stop talking about you. So you still own your shares, right? I am so sick of talking about fucking Twitter. Anyway.

Do you like the name? I like the name. Twitter Blue. Twitter Blue? Twitter Blue. That is nice. Good for them. That is a nice name.

Good branding. Good branding. All right, someday. Let me say, I love the product. I'm addicted to Twitter. Yep. They need to do more. We should run Twitter.

We should run Twitter. What do you think? Did I tell you I was on Anderson Cooper last week? No, what happened? You know, he was just a little bored. He thought, I'll call up my good friend and I'll bring him on. Yeah, what did you talk about?

And guess what? You know that picture I took on my counter of my salute to Miley Cyrus' wrecking ball? Yes, that was lovely. He put it on screen. And then he put my great Dan on screen. So this is a message to all you kids out there. Be careful what you do on edibles. It might end up on CNN. It might end up on screen. So this is a message to all you kids out there. Be careful what you do on edibles. It might end up on CNN.

It might end up on CNN. He put your picture of Miley Cyrus posing. He told me it made him uncomfortable. I'm mad at Ando this week. I'm mad at him. Why are you mad at him? Because he did a 60 Minutes show on facial recognition. And it's literally the pioneering research

has been done by women of color. And he managed to find a white guy with cool glasses and talk to him. I just had done a podcast on this. So I really was up on it. And I was like, there's this one woman who's at MIT who did the pioneering work. And he managed to get the white guy to talk about it. Just I was like, and he's talking. Well, this week, he's doing a great story on LGBTQ rights, and you know who he's interviewing?

You'll like this. A white guy. John Stankey. That's good humor. He's a tall drinker. See how I bring it all together. Oh, God. All right, we're going to get speaking of HBK and lesbian.

We're going to go right to our friend. You paid $2.95 to follow me on Twitter. Our friend of pivot. friend of Pivot. Sarah Kate Ellis is the president of GLAAD, the U.S. nonprofit monitoring defamatory coverage of the LGBTQ community for many years. It's been around. I'm a very good friend of theirs. This week, GLAAD released the Social Media Safety Index, the first ever baseline evaluation of LGBTQ safety across social media platforms. I've helped, I've given them some advice on it and what to do and how to create it. They have done this in the past around movies

and television and all kinds of things. And that was the first time they're looking at social media, which is important because all kinds of anti-gay hatred is all over it, including, especially around trans people right now with all these lawsuits across the country. So tell us more about the index. What does it measure? And what's, why is the metric important, Sarah Cade?

Well, hi. Thanks so much for having me. I'm grateful for being here. So here's the deal. The reason why we did this is because research report after research report showcases that the most harassed and the group that has the most hate speech against it is the LGBTQ community. By far, the only second to that is Muslims at 46%. LGBTQ is at 64%. That's a report from the ADL. Pew Research shows that one out of six LGBTQ people are harassed online daily. So while we've been doing this and releasing this, people have asked us, oh, can you get us some examples of people? And I say, ask any LGBTQ person and they will tell you if they have a social media account. So it is an imperative for our community. As we know, government is dragging its feet. They're taking so long to regulate this industry.

Right. And it's going to be very hard in that area to regulate, by the way, from speech and speech. Yeah. Well, I mean, you can really draw a direct line. Those bills that you were talking to, there's a hundred, over a hundred anti-LGBTQ bills. You can find all that misinformation that builds up those bills on the social platform. Yeah. So what is the metric? What is the metric you're going to use? You're going to grade them A's, B's, C's? You've done it before with movies.

You call attention for years and years. You've all pointed out various and also rewarded things that were good, done well in movies. Absolutely. There's a hammer and a carrot we use. That's our approach. I always say you can't move what you don't measure. And so we were going to give grades this year, and we decided to forego that because they all failed. And what we did instead was provide them with a roadmap to success to get rid of a lot of this hate speech, to get rid of a lot of this harassment and this misinformation.

And we gave them the ways to do it. We will be giving grades next year based on this roadmap that we've provided and how they've performed against it. But we will be holding them accountable all year long as this goes day to day. So the way that we've put this report together, which is what I think you're asking me, is that we did, first of all, we created an advisory committee of some top minds at the intersection of LGBTQ advocacy and technology. And then what we did was a literature review, because quite frankly, there's so much out there, and you two know this better than anyone, there's so much out there already. It's never been viewed through the LGBTQ lens. And so that's the lens that we put on

it. And then what we did was we did a review of all these, we did the five major social media platforms, we reviewed their policies, their forward-facing policies, and then we tested those policies to find out how they actually enforced them or if they actually enforced them. If they did. All right. Yeah, and they really didn't. Scott? Sarah Kay, nice to meet you. I did something I almost never do for one of our interviews, and that is I prepared. Oh, no. And a piece of data that actually, like, it really, like, kind of instilled me, for lack of a better term, is that, so suicide's a second leading cause of death among young people, 10 to 24, and LGBTQ youth contemplate suicide at three times the rate of their heterosexual

peers. There was a study by the American Pediatric Foundation that found that 51% of transgender male teens reported attempting suicide, 30% of transgender female teens. You know, it feels to me like if there was a place that almost everyone on the political spectrum would agree is a worthwhile effort, is trying to change those

numbers. What can we do? This to me really seems like a legitimate crisis that warrants a pretty serious action plan. Well, thanks for pointing that out. And yeah, it's horrible, those numbers, and it's scary, and it does point to a crisis. And I think one of the places that we could really help these kids is on the social media platforms, because this is where they go to meet each other. This has been a lifeline for our community. That's why it's so sad to see it being weaponized now, right? This has been an organizing tool, a lifeline for so many LGBTQ people to find each other because it wasn't safe on the streets or in a bar or in public spaces and places to meet each other. So making this place safe for LGBTQ people would change that number dramatically. And I can say that because you can easily see

how despicable it is online. The first comment when this was announced last week, and it was written to me, was, as a gay woman, they said, you should never feel safe. You don't have a right. That was the first comment made on this. What was it on? What platform? It was, yeah, on Twitter. Right. So let me ask you, are there any platforms doing a better job at protecting LGBTQ users?

Because let me just remember, AOL was one of the first places these chat rooms started where gay people could meet each other. Planet Out was funded by them. I mean, I'm real old, so I remember it. But it was one of the first places that actively used social media essentially for good, like in terms of meeting, feeling safe. I remember Megan, my ex-wife, ran Planet Out for a while, and she was like, we have 61 members at Vatican City, whatever. And it was like, you know, hundreds here, but it protected them in a safe way. And same thing with the dating apps and things like that. But in this case, are there any platforms that are better or what are the worst, really?

I think probably is a better question. I would say there aren't many platforms that are better. TikTok might be, but it's so new that they just have to sit to get off the floor in this, right? Facebook is the absolute worst. The harassment- Shocker. Shocker. Oh my, you're, really?

Really? I know, I know, I know. I'm preaching to the fire here. But they are- Because it's the biggest or what? Well, you know what? That's a great question, Cara. One of the big problems, transparency. We don't know why it's the worst, but 74% of LGBTQ people say that they've been harassed on that site and that they've had

hate spewed at them. So I think we don't know why. It could be because it's the biggest. It could be because it's the most prolific and that people are on it more often than not. But we don't have the transparency from them. Have they cooperated with you? They just won't. No, I mean, here. They are open to the discussion. They were grateful for the report. We took them through the report. They were grateful for that. But at one point, I said, and they've acted.

They took LifeSite down. You know, there's going to be some. Look, I think this report is actually going to move the bar forward. I can see it already is. I know the meetings that are being had because of this report. It's not single-handedly going to change it, but it is going to make it a little safer for some people in our community. At the end of the day, why does a not-for-profit have to create a report on people who are monetizing hate and harassment. That was my question back to them. And I think

that's the bigger question, is that this monetization of hate is at the expense of marginalized communities, especially the LGBTQ community. That's a much bigger discussion, and that's where we really need government to step in and take action. government to step in and take action. Scott? Do you think, so when someone comes on Facebook and says something hateful as they did to you, do you have any research or gut feel for how much of it is just a generally hateful person and how much of it is bad actors who are purposely trying to divide us and using this hatefulness and pouring gasoline on it and leveraging a platform that doesn't enforce identity, that doesn't enforce standards,

that doesn't prevent hate speech, that will meet with you and tell you they're proud of the progress we've made and find your report just fucking fascinating and then do nothing. How much of it do you think is true hate and how much of it do you think is potentially bad actors trying to exploit

and amplify that hate with platforms that are built to amplify controversial content? I apologize for the long-winded question. No, it's a great question. And I don't know the answer, but I do know this, that we have been working with Facebook for a year and a half to get ads that have misinformation about HIV prevention. It's called Prep for All taken down. We met with them not too long ago, a year and a half later, and they finally have found a way to stop this a little bit, not fully. There's not a full response to it. But a year and a half later, there are 16 bad actors that are sending out these ads that are literally scaring, especially gay men, not to using a preventative health pharmaceutical product.

To discourage people from taking prophylactic anti-HIV. Yeah. And Facebook's allowing it. Not prophylactic. It's a pill, but- Yeah, right. It serves, I apologize, I'm using the wrong term, but this basically, I don't want to say, it prevents it, right? Yes. Yeah, pretty much. And Facebook has decided to cash the checks of people who are dampening the uptake of this, resulting in more people getting HIV. Is that right? Facebook inaction equals more HIV. Do I have that algorithm correct? You do. It is. It actually is. And we have scenarios. We have the data around that. We

have people who have gone to their doctors and refused the help because they said they saw these ads. You know, what's interesting, too too is I remember at YouTube, you haven't mentioned Google and YouTube because YouTube is a real center too. I was talking with the CEO, Susan Wojcicki, and she said one of the things is they took down someone for a lot of anti-gay stuff, like really hate speech essentially. And what he did is he made ads out of them rather than the content became ads.

And then the ads went on to gay sites, like gay friendly sites. And all the gay people were like, what are you doing putting ads on our, so she was like, I didn't even know they were going to do that. Like it was like, they didn't have control of their platform

and that they let the anti-gay ads get on gay sites. It was astonishing. Like, and she was like, oh, and it was like, I don't know what to say to you. Just shut him down. All, everything, every part of him, shut this guy down. And it was difficult for them to wrap their heads around the damage it causes. Well, so one of the companion pieces to this report is an index that we're launching that is going to be very much like the ADL, Symbols of Hate Index, so that people have a place to report those things. There's no

place really to go except to outer space to report those things. But now you can come to GLAAD.org and you can report it. We will record it. We're not going to be able to handle it all because I imagine the influx is going to be overwhelming, but we're going to prioritize them. And they'll be prioritized probably mostly on how viral they're going, right? So that how big of a damage can they do? Sure, sure. And then we're going to be fighting back on them on a daily basis. My last question is, what do you need from a regulatory point of view?

And then Scott might have a final question. But what do you need, like a reform of Section 230, liability? What do you think will work? Because you've just sort of entered this thing that we've been been talking about white supremacy, whether it's this and that. What do you imagine would work for, because you're all sort of, whether it's anti-Semitism or racism or whatever, it's all the same kind of use of these tools to create problems for marginalized communities. So what do you need from a regulatory point of view? for marginalized communities. So what do you need from a regulatory point of view?

I don't know the particulars of what I need just yet. I do know that we need help and we need them to step in. I think just like they stepped in on the auto industry or tobacco, this is a runaway car and we need somebody to throw up some stop signs and talk about how to make better brakes. throw up some stop signs and talk about, you know, how to make better breaks. And then I think also what we want to do is I want people to know about this report because I think it's really important, obviously. And I want, I also think that we need people to report this and to stand up for this and to support each other on this, because it is, it's unbelievable what's going out, out there. And, you know, you talk about YouTube, there's this, there's a site called PragerU that literally target is the LGBTQ community. They create videos and pay for them to go viral so that they can paint a picture of who the LGBTQ community and they make money off

of it. They're making money off of it. So we need them demonetized. You know, on the other side of this too, what's really important to understand is that we're the most censored on these platforms too. So when people start to say, oh, you're trying to censor the internet. No, we're not trying to censor the internet. We're we're not trying to censor the internet. We're the most censored on the internet, if you look at it. We get taken down the most by using the word bisexual or lesbian. Lesbian was a word that was being shut down. We get demonetized the most as creators.

So we're really seeing it from both sides as the LGBTQ community. Scott, last question. My question is really more personal. I'm just curious, who are your heroes? Who do you think is fighting the good fight in your eyes? I think, you know, I live in a community now where we're seeing it come into the schools. There is no offline and online anymore. There's just life and they've blended.

And so we're seeing what's going on online come right into our middle schools, our elementary schools, our high schools. It's disheartening. I think that my heroes right now are those mothers, fathers, and parents who are standing up in the schools. It's pretty rough out there right now. Especially the trans stuff, especially with all these bills that are going on. Oh my goodness. They're trying to demonize athletes, I mean, attack kids. I mean, that's perfect. And it's showing up in our schools. And I'm in a suburb outside New York City. I'm not, you know, and we're seeing it.

Yeah. Amazing. By the way, Kate's also a former media executive, right? You were at, was it Time? Yeah. That's the one thing I wanted to say. I was at Time and Condé Nast, but we, you know, I've been a lot of these meetings and so I understand journalism. I wasn't a journalist. I was on the business side and every meeting I have at these social media platforms, I say, who worked in journalism here? Not one hand. They don't know how it works. They don't understand how the world works in that and how we built a model back then that was fair and equitable and gave voice and platform to all, but didn't use it as a weapon. Yep, indeed. All right. Just real quick, who in the House of Representatives or in the U.S. Senate do you think has shown leadership

and courage around these issues? You know, I think, of course, Elizabeth Warren has been at the forefront of this. I think a lot of people are really starting to, I think the past few years has been an education for these folks. I really think they were just opening their laptop for the first time, quite honestly. And now they're starting to understand, especially in the past year, what we've seen happen and transpire and how much the offline world has impacted or the online world has impacted the offline world. So I think we're going to see more heroes coming. I'm hopeful for that. All right. Sarah Kate Ellis of GLAAD.

I urge you, where can people get the report and look at it? Everyone gets Fs. Fs all around. Like my son's science grade this year. But go ahead. It's at GLAAD.org. GLAAD.org. Okay, so it's out and everyone can look at it ahead. It's at glad.org. Glad.org. Okay, so it's out and everyone can look at it.

And we look forward to more in the future. This is a really important area and it applies across the spectrum, not just with the LGBTQ people. Just this is the same song, just bad as ever. Anyway, we appreciate it. Thanks for your good work, Sarah Kate. Thank you very much.

All right, Scott, one more quick break. I'm thrilled that you brought research to bear here. We'll be back for wins and fails. The Capital Ideas Podcast now features a series hosted by Capital Group CEO, Mike Gitlin. Through the words and experiences of investment professionals, you'll discover what differentiates their investment approach, what learnings have shifted their career trajectories, and how do they find their next great idea. Invest 30 minutes in an episode today.

Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. Published by Capital Client Group, Inc. Do you feel like your leads never lead anywhere? And you're making content that no one sees? And it takes forever to build a campaign? Well, that's why we built HubSpot. It's an AI-powered customer platform that builds campaigns for you. Tells you which leads are worth knowing.

And makes writing blogs, worth knowing, and makes writing blogs, creating videos, and posting on social a breeze. So now, it's easier than ever to be a marketer. Get started at HubSpot.com slash marketers. Okay, Scott, wins and fails. I have a win. Go for it. Go for it.

Murder dirter. Mayor of Easttown. That was your win two weeks fails. I have a win. Go for it. Go for it. Murder, dirter. Mayor of Easttown. That was your win two weeks ago. I don't care. This week was crazy. It was really good. I can't tell you what happened, but oh my God. I was like, what?

It was shocking. Are you watching it now? By the way, that scene. Are you watching it now? Are you kidding? I love it. I didn't know you did. I love it when it comes out.

I love it. By the way, that one scene, and I won't give it away, but that one scene in the house, in this episode, did that take you back to another famous movie? One of the great movies of the early 90s? Silence of the Lambs? It was 100%. Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. That was literally, it sent chills up my spine how similar it was to that one scene.

And for people who haven't seen it yet, you'll know exactly what we're talking about. But it's really a wonderful series. I gotta say, I was like, what? I never know what when I'm watching. I did not expect that. And also the comedy scene, but we don't have to give anything away, between her and Jean Smart. Come on, that's a spoiler. It's not a spoiler. It's comedy and drama together. I have to say, love the murder-dirter. Everybody must watch murder-dirter. Make John Stanky some money. I mean, maybe, okay, thanks John Stanky, love the murder dirter. Everybody must watch murder dirter. Make John Stanky some money. I mean, maybe, okay. Thanks John Stanky for murder dirter. That's right. There's a pattern here next week. Your win's going to be Mayor of Downton or whatever name. Anyways. All right. On to whatever it's called.

I have lots of fails this week. Go ahead. Your wins and fails, please. My win and fail is sort of the same thing. just different sides of the coin, and that is the CDC's updated guidance around masking. And that is, I actually think the CDC does so many wonderful things, but one of the most important things they've done is issue communication guidelines. And they are kind of speaking with one of the loudest voices in the world right now, trying to make sense of all of this very difficult situation. voices in the world right now trying to make sense of all of this very difficult situation. And they put out a guidance saying that if you're fully vaccinated in certain situations, you don't have to wear a mask. And I actually, they got immediately criticized. And I thought, well, actually, at some point when you're telling your kids at the age of 25, they should never drink, they stop listening to you altogether. And I think that their comments need to have veracity. And

I think they also have to acknowledge how people are actually behaving and what's realistic. So I think the strategy was right here. Now, the fail, the fail is that they missed an opportunity to put some guidelines on it to say states where they have over 50% vaccinated or a lower than 1% infection rate can go to that. They had an opportunity to create goals, which would have been really meaningful in this fight. And two, whenever you're communicating something that's really important, you want to pre-bake it. In other words, what I tell, what I coach CEOs is if you have something really important you're talking to the board about, you don't want it to be a surprise. You want to check in with everybody. And where they really,

I think, failed here is they should have gotten all the governors online, which are to a certain extent, if you think about them being a manufacturer's brand, and there's the customer, the retailers, and then there's the end consumer, which are citizens, but the customers or their stakeholders are governors. They should have got all the governors on the phone a few days before and said, this is what we're thinking. What do you think? And even if the governors had disagreed, they would have felt like they were briefed. And all these governors that are responsible for implementing this and enforcing it felt blindsided. So right strategy, really ham-handed execution. I think everyone's super confused. Everybody. My family alone, we were having dinner in New York and I was like, can we eat inside? We ended

up eating outside because it was a beautiful weekend. But I got to say, we had an argument about it. Like, nobody knew what to do. It was like, you know, my one son, who's very cautious, was like, masks on. And the other was like, whatever. Like, because the CDC says. So, everyone now goes CDC, CDC, which is interesting. But you could almost apply to everything. I agree.

I think it's really problematic. Fail, please. Was that a fail or a win? No, that's my other. A fail, please. Was that a fail or a win? No, that's my, and my other, I have two wins. My other big win is US government, CDC, Pfizer, and Walgreens. I took my 13-year-old son to get his first vaccine, and it was one of those moments where I-

A wheel gets down, yeah. One of those moments where I really felt very emotional. I just thought I'm so fortunate to be in a society that mostly embraces science, and I'm appreciative to Pfizer, I'm appreciative to Walgreens, and my son brought it up to me and wanted to do it. But it just felt very good to have, you know,

my son participating in this effort to not be a fiber in this web of death-snaring people. It was just a nice moment, so I'm very grateful. Okay, I have a fail. Let me try and think. I don't really have a fail this week. I think vax i think we're sending vaccines abroad 20 million vaccines abroad which i think is great we'd send a lot more if we have them um i don't know how to feel about parlor being back on the apps for what i think i probably think it's a good thing if they

have new rules on hate speech i'm not i think that's a good thing because i was a part in getting that taken down so um i wasn't a part, the CEO was, but I think that was, I can't tell if it's a win or a fail, but it's, that's what's happening. It's something. It's something. Why are you going out on a limb there? It's something. All right. It's something.

All right. Matt Gaetz is going to be a fail. That's, we're going to watch that one, but I don't care about him. He's such a loser. So I don't really care. Best thing that happened to Matt Gaetz was Bill Gates. That story's like gone on the back shelf. Seriously. Seriously. Matt Gaetz is like, I'm buying windows. Thank you to Matt Gaetz was Bill Gates. That story's like gone on the back shelf. Seriously. Seriously. Matt Gaetz is like, I'm buying windows. Thank you, Bill Gaetz. Yeah.

Yeah, that's true. They're talking about another Gaetz. Fine. That is a great line, Scott. Once again, as usual, fantastic insight. Go on. Fantastic insight. Go on. But let me just tell you, Matt Gaetz, what Bill Gaetz did is not even close to what Matt

Gaetz is allegedly, allegedly, is supposed to be doing. We'll see what's going to happen. It's going to unveil now, because the guy who was his little friend in their little escapades is now pleaded out. So we'll see what happens to Matt Gaetz. Hopefully bad things. Anyway, Scott, that's the show. We'll be back on Friday for more. This was a very educational show. Very educational. Lots going on. Go to nymag.com slash pivot to submit your question for the Pivot podcast.

The link is also in our show notes. Please read us out. Today's show was produced by Rebecca Sinanis, Ernie Entretat, engineer of this episode. Thanks also to Drew Burrows.

Make sure you subscribe to the show on Apple Podcasts or if you're an Android user, check us out on Spotify or wherever you listen to podcasts. If you liked our show, please recommend it to a friend. Thanks for listening to Pivot from New York Magazine and Vox Media. We'll be back later

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