Pivot - Facebook Oversight Board and the Trump ban, trouble for Peloton and a listener question about AI

Episode Date: May 7, 2021

Kara and Scott talk about the Facebook Oversight Board's decision to uphold Facebook's ban of Donald Trump's Facebook account... for the next six months. Then they talk about Peloton recalling, their treadmills, and how the company handled the crisis. In listener mail, we get a question about how Google has dealt with ethics as it relates to artificial intelligence. And in predictions, we have more thoughts on Dogecoin. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Hi everyone, this is Pivot from the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher. And I would like to seriously explore a relationship with Bill Gates. Let's be honest. It makes sense, Kara. It makes sense. Okay. Let me hear it. It makes sense. Okay. So, I'm going to ask you a serious question. All right.

Essentially, every woman I know who is married and over the age of 45, called me and told me how rattled they were by this news. Can you give me a sense for why you think people were so rattled by it? Well, you know, having been divorced, I'm not rattled at all. So, I feel, here's the deal. They did a lot of things jointly. And one of the things that I think Bill Gates has done very well, a lot of these very wealthy men sort of leave their wives behind and sort of in the background, even if they're critical, you don't see them as much. And he and she were front and center. She was a former Microsoft executive, actually, was responsible for things like Microsoft Bob. I like her. I don't think he's ever forgiven her for that. Did you ever use Bob?

Anyway, sorry, go ahead. Yes, I haven't forgiven him for Zoom. But in any case, I think they were a pair. And so when people, you know, I would reference my own divorce. When I got divorced, I had several people that says, you can't. It's upsetting to me. And I was like, because they saw it as like, what it does is it questions everyone's marriage, right? Like if that's not going to work, this isn't going to work. And it's well beyond that. It makes you start to think about whether you're happy, just like the pandemic has. I think a lot

of people have, you know, marriages have gotten hit in the pandemic and this and that, or they've gotten strengthened, which is interesting. And so what I think what people do is they start, one person called me when I got divorced and they said, how unhappy were you when you got divorced? And I said, what? How many percent? And I was like, what? And they were like, I'm 37% happy. And I was like, you should get a divorce. And they did. They actually did.

It was interesting. So that's what I think it is. I think that's why. And again, they're also, you want that foundation to work out. You want them to like to help the world and save COVID covet itself people from covet etc i think i don't know what do you think um i thought part i mean we i've been divorced

too i thought one of the worst things was people coming up to me five years later and saying uh you know how's margaret not have to go oh we're no longer together and they look at you and they cock their head and they go oh i'm I'm so sorry. And it's just like, oh, shit, I really have to go through this. And look, marriage is, at the time you decide to do that, it's you saying, look, I think there's a shot we're going to spend the rest of our lives together. And so when it doesn't work, there's just a part of you that's – it's just upsetting. I just don't think there's any way to get around it. The thing that is interesting is this woman who's known as Miss Swiss or Swiss Miss who's a designer on Twitter. I thought she had the best take in that.

She said that divorce needs a rebranding. And the reality is people – Sounds like your next book. Go ahead. Yeah. I'm going to write a book on divorce. Anyways, I'm just going to live it over and over. Better not let go of your fine wife. The reality on her side. I'm on Kate, Scott's wife. Go ahead. When people would ask me honestly about divorce, I'd say, look, the reality is we

didn't have kids and we had money, which really softens the blow. Because if you look at divorce, it's typically for women, two out of five women who get divorced slip into poverty. And they're more likely to lose their house. They're more likely to have a greater struggle repartnering. I saw how hard it was for my mom to date with an eight-year-old son at home. So, but the reality is money- Especially dad eight-year-old son. Oh, God. That was nice. That was nice. People love me.

My dad's third wife thought I was the cutest thing ever. Anyways, first woman who stole me, Linda Galloway, will love her forever. Anyways, the- But the bottom line is, in a capitalist society, when you get divorced, if you have money, and your kids are out of the house, it really isn't that bad. And it's not going to be, quite frankly, it's just not going to be bad for either of them. I'm already – Well, no. It's just people in the world.

I mean, I think the issue is around the philanthropy. The philanthropy. Oh, but they're both – that's the whole don't break them up argument. So, they're each going to have $80 billion to try and solve the world's problems. They're both incredibly competent. The Gates Foundation is probably the most important philanthropy in the history of the world. I mean, really, truly. So, they are joined together.

They are joined together. And it's a huge operation, obviously. And they sort of broke a lot of eggs in the philanthropy world. Is that right? Like, oh, yeah, there's a lot of philanthropy people. I don't know. I began, just to kind of help Bill out, I began binging Bottle Service Miami. Okay.

And I sent him romantic love songs to his Zune. Yeah. Okay. By the way, that's the official Sean Penn Twitter account. That woman's a genius, whoever she is. Can I just say, I don't think you, and knowing both of you, I feel that you're not Bill's type. I'll be honest with you. You know, so just so you know, I've assembled a dating oversight board for Bill Gates.

It consists of me, Ben Affleck, Stephanie Ruhl, and Billy Bob Thornton. Hey, Ben Affleck might be back with J-Lo, according to the tabloids. Well, you know he gets the best drugs. He gets the best drugs, and Bill should start experimenting. In any case... I was in Tulum. Speaking of drugs... Go ahead, Tulum. I was in Tulum, and I was at this amazing rave, and I drank tequila, and I took half an edible, and I thought, oh my God, I'm so down, I'm so rebellious. And I looked around, I said to my

friend, I said, how come I'm not having as good a time as everyone else here? Everyone, A, looks much better looking than me. Right. Is much more fashionable. And they're all so much happier. And he's like, they're all on Molly, dude. And I'm like, what the fuck is Molly and how do I get some? Anyways, Bill Gates and Molly.

That's his next marriage. That's his next marriage. I'm setting him up with a lovely, happy woman named Molly. Let's focus a little bit on Melinda Gates for a second. I have to say, she's really quite a remarkable woman. I've interviewed her many, many times. I really like talking to her. One time when she was being interviewed by Walt Mossberg on the stage of, at the time, All Things D.

And Bill and I have had sort of a testy relationship, a little tense. It's gotten better over the years. But we were backstage, and I turned to him, and I said, and listening to her, because she was so— We were backstage, and I turned to Bill Gates. Well, smell your shit. Seriously. This is what I was doing. God.

I was backstage, and I turned to him, and I said, you know what? Listening to her, I like you 10% more. Oh, my God. God. I was texting. I mean, really? And I turned to him and I said, you know what? Listening to her, I like you 10% more. Oh, my God. That's what I said. And he turned to me and he said, meeting Megan, I like you 10% more. Reminds me of the time I was making out with Tom Brady and I said, you know, Tom? God. I'm just telling you, she deserves some attention.

She has a company called Pivotal that's making a lot of investments in women-focused things. I think that's an IP infringement. Where's our lawyer? She's Pivotal. Bank off. Pivotal Ventures. Cease and desist. I think she was around before we were.

She's got more money than we do. In any case, I just feel like you need to devote more attention to our work marriage than you do. That's all I'm saying. A present now and then would be nice. Things like that. Hey, listen. I show up to this relationship. I show up.

And by the way, it's Mother's Day. I am clearly the mother in this relationship. Yeah, that's true. There better be something nice. All right. There better be something nice. Yeah, I'm sending you a nice fruit basket. Listen, the other thing that's interesting is a couple things.

Well, from the desk of Donald J. Trump, that blog, what do you think? He might be trying to compete with us. Well, the important news is I think it's time that you and I announce that we're consciously uncoupling and we just stayed together until Giant Man and Cougar Town are out of the house. Oh, that's good. That's good. Cougar Town wasn't happy we talked about it, and yet he was. That's how it went with that. I hate you. I love you. Is that what's one of those things? He likes the attention. He's so good.

If he has any of your DNA, he likes the attention. Yeah, he does. Indeed, he does. You know, Amanda's parents are coming this weekend for the weekend to see Golden Child. Have you ever spent an extended amount of time with Amanda's parents? I have. They're loved. They are so nice.

The problem I have with them, and she listens to this all the time, is they are so nice. I'm not used to it because i we grew up in sort of like you know raised by wolves lucky into that mix you gotta add a little salsa to that i'm always suspect of their niceness i'm like why are they so nice what do they want like what's going on so it's terrible because they're the loveliest loveliest people you can tell amanda played with the right toys and they like showed up their recitals. She seems very comfortable with herself. They're all nice to each other. I'm like, when are the knives coming out?

I find that usually means they're addicted to diet pills when you find out that they're really nice. They're lovely, lovely. It's my problem. We haven't talked about tech yet, just so you know. Twitter is building out a subscription plan by buying Scroll, a startup that sells subscription ad blocking service and distributes most of its revenue to publishers. This is interesting for us. What do you think about this? As a shareholder, what do you think about this?

Twitter's a little bit on a roll here. I don't know. Did you see their earnings? The stock threw up. Yeah, they did. Yeah, look, I think Jack Dorsey is the most innovative or one of the most innovative CEOs in history. Unfortunately, it's Square where he's been really innovative with Cash App. They keep, I mean, enough already. They keep doing this head fake around subscription. Yeah. I wonder where they got that idea. And then they don't do anything. So, it's like-

All right. So, what do you imagine? Talk about the results because they weren't good. But they were good. They're doing fine, but go ahead. Not the way you want them to do. I think people are just getting sick of being promised an awesome weekend in Cancun, and it never happens. They say the right things. If you look at the word count, on average, Jack Dorsey is responsible for 30% to 60% more words on a Square earnings call than a Twitter earnings call. He's just not engaged. He's not, the product development at Twitter is very anemic. They've been talking about subscription for a long time.

They really haven't delivered against it. They have made some interesting acquisitions. I think their entry into the audio space has been pretty elegant. But look, they need to command the space they occupy. They should be acquiring original content. My idea is I think they should acquire CNN, which in my view is clearly up for sale. And they need to start busting a move to subscription.

Kara, if they just got 2% or 3% of their revenue from subscription, but that 2% or 3% was growing faster than the core business, the stock would be at triple digits. They need a CEO that's fully engaged. I like Jack Dorsey, and I like a lot of his decisions. I think he is very innovative. I do think they need a real CEO. Because I've talked to a lot of their executives. I had a long talk with Kayvon Beckmore about Twitter Spaces, and so smart. Kayvon?

Isn't that the model dating Bill Gates? Kayvon Damore? Instead of product. But he brought a really smart guy named Alex. They're so smart. And I really do enjoy talking to them. It's like you sort of are like, this is a good group of people that could be really engaged with a much more engaged CEO. As interesting and innovative as Dorsey is.

I think at this annual meeting, the standstill and the staggered board de-stagger. So if the board, and there's several new board members, let me just say, this stock doesn't get back up to where it was. I think Jack is going to peace out and have peace with honor. I mean, granted, I've been saying that for about 25 years now. Yeah, 25 years. Exactly, 25 years. But anyway, I'm a shareholder, but it just strikes me, what's so frustrating is the strategy for triple digits here just is they understand what they need to do. They keep saying they're going to do it. And at some point, Twitter, at some point, Twitter, tomorrow needs to be today. So we need a conscious uncoupling.

Say we really love Jack Dorsey. We loved his decision on Trump. We thought that was great. We think he's innovative. Oh, he deserves so many applauds for banning the account 1,439 days into the 1,460-day tenure. Scott, we're trying

to consciously uncouple in a lovely way right now. Oh, my God. We're trying to get him to do it. You're not on the program. You are Twitter's oversight board. Yes, we should be

the oversight board. Anyway, we're going to get to that now with the big story. Facebook's oversight board has decided to uphold the company's decision to ban former President Donald Trump from the platform. But just for six months, they made a decision not to make a decision. I kind of like it. On Wednesday, the panel of lawyers, activists and journalists voted, agreeing that Facebook had made the right decision to ban Trump in January.

But the board also kicked the case back to Facebook Facebook saying that indefinite suspension was not appropriate, meaning they never defined it. Actually, what they're talking about is there were no rules and what they uncovered was somewhat disturbing. They argued the penalty is not defined in the Facebook policies and the company shouldn't indefinitely post a ban, just like you can't indefinitely put someone in jail. I guess you could in certain countries.

The board gave Facebook six months to make a final decision on Trump's account. This stuff is full of little jewels actually, like the fact that Facebook did not apply the newsworthy thing to Donald Trump, even though they said they did to me and other people. And some of their

quotes from it were real slapped to Facebook, essentially saying, you have abrogated responsibility, which is something I have said a lot. In a statement, Trump said, free speech has been taken away from the president of the United States because the radical left lunatics are afraid of the truth. This is not true. He lies.

Ted Cruz and other Republicans sort of took, made similar comments, this and that, saying, you know, if it happened to him, it could happen to you. And I was like, yeah, it could happen to you if I do seditious nonsense and lies. Meanwhile, Trump has officially launched his own social media platform from the desk of Donald J. Trump to speak freely and safely. It's just a, it's like a PR blog. That's from what I can tell. So tell me what you think. I spent the

morning interviewing Alan Rusbridger, who is on the board of former Guardian editor. Very interesting stuff. What do you think? What do you think? Well, this is the UN. Very thoughtful, very smart people, and totally ineffective. Because unless you have an aircraft carrier that can deploy F-15s and drop bombs on your ass, no one gives a fuck what you think. And quite frankly, this is all just posturing and a distraction from facts such as the following. Two-thirds of people on Facebook who joined an extremist group joined it because it was suggested to them by Facebook. This is a distraction. This is not within the board's purview to deal with that.

But go ahead. This is – It should be, perhaps. Okay, so Mark Zuckerberg said a few years ago, I want to start a supreme – Fingalist is what you're saying. He said, I want to create a supreme court. He thinks he's a country. He thinks he's the president.

But it's not a government and a capitalist or free society. This is the Kremlin. And that is they get to make recommendations. they get to make decisions until Putin disagrees. And the notion that this thing has any authority whatsoever other than faux shaming, which, by the way, Mark and Cheryl have shown incredible resilience to shaming. I'll give them that. I said that to Alan. He said, well, maybe this will shame them. And I said, except they're shameless. The notion they give a shit that a bunch of PhD students of Boutros Ghali scold them, they could give a fuck. I mean, this is, again, this only confirms one thing. I hate Facebook.

Okay. hate Facebook. And you know what's so sad? I have sort of a similar feeling. You know how sad you were about learning about Bill and Melinda? You know what I did when my oldest son was born? One of the first things I did was I went and got his Facebook account, Facebook name. Remember how you were supposed to reserve? And then I sent the email with the confirmation from Facebook for my son to my girlfriend saying, I had so much hope for Facebook. Think about if Facebook wasn't run by gross and grosser or psychopath and sociopath and grossopath. Think about the good they could have done for the world. They have literally so much influence to say, let's create amplifications of good. influence to say, let's create amplifications of good, or let's create algorithms of aspiration instead of algorithms of amplification of anything that enrages people. They had such potential

to do so much good for the world. And I said, you know what? If we divide and polarize and delay and obfuscate, I can go from 30 billion to 60 billion. Jesus Christ, what a fucking disappointment Facebook is. Anyway, sorry, go ahead. Let's talk about this group, because they did point out a couple of critical things, which was that Facebook has no systems for this, which we knew, but we didn't know. So, that's one thing, and that they didn't have any. They just did this haphazardly. They threw around the term arbitrary, haphazard, et cetera, et cetera, that they had been talking about this idea of newsworthiness, which is really more a Twitter idea than anything else,

but they never applied it to him and that he broke their laws a dozen or more times explicitly and they didn't do any of it. So they had arbitrary punishments in place. They didn't do anything about it. They knew it was happening and they had no good reason. Like they didn't, they couldn't point to anything. And so, and another one, some of the recommendations I actually did agree with, like keeping the policy people away, I mean, keeping the people who deal with this stuff away from the policy people,

Casey Newton called it the Joel Kaplan protection program. Some of the, you know, being more transparent of if you are in trouble on Twitter, I mean, Twitter, excuse me, Facebook, you know where you are. So it's more explicit, being more transparent about how they make these decisions and what they do. And so I do think there is some value in a group of people saying, fuck you, you deal with it. They were a leaf. And I think Facebook did the indefinite designation in order to toss it over, toss over the bag of shit to them. And they said, no, thank you, Mr. Zuckerberg.

Here you go. It's your bag of shit and you better deal with it. And I think that was interesting. I do think that was an, I was not expecting it because this was a very free speechy crowd, but they were quite, they kind of had it with Facebook in an interesting way.

And I never mind that. But maybe you think it doesn't matter. This is nothing but more really elegant, ingenious delay and obfuscation from what needs to happen. They are accomplices to a sedition. Full stop. The board is. The board? Well, not really because the board has no power. Right.

That's what I mean. But I like that he tossed it back to them. I got to say, I was like, good for you. You understood what he was doing. So we all just continue to wring our hands around the decision of a fake board with no teeth and no authority such that we don't zero in on the individual who is solely responsible for coordinating sedition or his platform enabled sedition. Season five of The Handmaid's Tale isn't very good. Season six should be Mark Zuckerberg handmade to sedition.

And all this bullshit, Facebook and oversight boards, and oh, they kick it back, and they scold Mark Zuckerberg. Isn't that thoughtful? It's all a giant distraction. What happens? What happens? Because let me just read specifically what the scold was, the particular scold. In applying a vague standardless penalty and then referring this case to the board to resolve, Facebook seeks to avoid its responsibilities. The board declines Facebook's request and insists that Facebook apply and justify a defined penalty. So what happens from your perspective? What happens now?

Because he didn't get to hide behind this particular group. This group of people said no thanks. Of course he did. But he hasn't now. Now he's got to deal with it. It's just not real. I mean, okay, for six months. In six months, everyone's going to move on to the next scandal from Facebook. And then the new advice. I find this, look, this does nothing but wash over the fact that, for example, two-thirds of people on Facebook that joined, I'll say it again, an extremist group, did so because it was suggested to them by Facebook.

The group's functionality. And instead, everyone, including us, is now talking about this UN meets League of Nations meets YPO meets Masters of Fine Arts and Brown and London Economics Club bullshit group that feels self-important. Go ahead. And gets paid a lot of money to think big thoughts and write big reports that Mark Zuckerberg can pretend he's scolded and he's learned from and then go on dividing and polarizing. Well, let me just say, here's what has to happen. Congress has to happen. That's right. 100%. Mark Zuckerberg can pretend he's scolded and he's learned from and then go on dividing and polarizing. Well, let me just say, here's what has to happen. Congress has to happen. That's right. 100%. This group of people does not have the power to do that.

They took the power they had and used it to say, this sucks. We're not doing it. Congress really is the one that has to. It drives me crazy that Mark calls it a Supreme Court. I'm like, you can't have a Supreme Court you paid for, you bought and paid for. And they don't even wanna put up with this shit. They have no power. I'm saying Congress has power.

Go ahead. Yeah, there are two things that need to happen to Facebook. The first is Amy, the second is Klobuchar. Bring in the K-bomb, bring in the substance, have Lena Kahn and Tim Wu behind her, have her throw red meat at Ted Cruz and say, yeah, they're squelching conservative voices, Ted, let's go after them, and then turn away and leave, and then overwork her legislative staff 150 hours a week and start proposing legislation that breaks that shit up. And then those, what do you know, there might be

a social media network that says, you know what, we're going to call us crazy. We're going to put in standards that when someone decides to run ads trying to divide us and they pay in rubles, we're going to check that out. Or maybe we're going to say, hey, if Instagram is really depressing people under the age of 18, mostly females, we're not going to propose Instagram for kids. We will never do that. Competition will solve a lot of this problem. But these advisory boards, I got to get to them. They're genius. They're genius.

We're talking about it now. I did say, why didn't you just do a permanent ban? You could have done it. You did have the actual power to just do a permanent ban. And I think they just didn't want to be in sloppy seconds. I think that's really what it was. They could have banned Trump. But then again, they were doing, they could have started to make some of these actions.

The problem is they have limited power. In this case, they could have banned Trump. They absolutely could have banned Trump, but then again, they were doing, they could have started to make some of these actions. The problem is they have limited power. In this case, they could have banned Trump. They absolutely could have banned Trump, but declined to do so. And it isn't their job. But what do you think of the reaction of the Republicans? All performative, right? You had Lauren Boebert misrepresenting the First Amendment. You had Ted Cruz, you know, say if it happened to me, it's going to happen to him.

It's going to happen to Donald Trump being disgraceful, disgraceful, disgraceful. Meanwhile, attacking Mitch McConnell, Liz Cheney. Like, it was interesting. Kevin McCarthy was like the same thing on this bandwagon. And I'm like, didn't you just tell Liz Cheney to shut up? Go back in the back of the room and shut up? So that was interesting. They're using this.

They're going to try to use it as some fundraising technique, presumably. Yeah, I think that I would imagine a lot of Republicans behind the scenes are like, thank God, we just want this guy's out. I mean, the biggest fear, first off, there's about— Oh, yeah, they should send the board a giant bunch of roses. Forty-nine of the 50 Republican senators wake up every morning and look in the mirror and say, hello, Mr. President. They're all running for president, and they all want him out of the way. They all want to take his megaphone away. And you know, off mic, you reported, it's likely that what they really don't want is for Trump to be the nominee because he'll get

trounced by whoever the Democratic nominee is. So I think Republicans are like, thank God. Which is what Frank Luntz told me today, a very well-known Republican pollster who was being attacked by them because he says that, because he's saying that. Anyone that says anything against Trump gets really whacked really hard. That's a crazy person. Yes, you know, a loud mouth, let's move on. Trump PSD and yeah. Well, one of the things he's saying is the numbers don't lie. If you bring him as nominee, you're not going to attract anybody but crazies. And at the same time, he pointed out the Republicans can't get even close without the base, which he controls. So, they're kind of stuck in a really, they're kind of stuck like the Facebook board is stuck. They're stuck with him,

and they don't know what to do. All right, what's going to happen here? Nothing. So, nothing. Nothing, honey, right? I am getting bottle service from me and Bill Gates. I am going to be supportive of whatever Melinda Gates does. And I don't want to think about the Facebook oversight board. Oh, my God. What a bunch of bitches. Jesus Christ. Don't blame them.

Put the blame where it belongs, which is on Facebook. I agree. They're part of the con. They are literally, you know, the ultimate sting is we don't realize you've been conned. People have joined this board for fake relevance. And they're like, okay, I've got seven PhDs, and I was a deputy commissioner of agriculture out of Belgium, and I've been offered $300,000 a year to write thoughtful reports that have no meaning. He wouldn't tell me how much they're making. Knock yourself out. He said in the hundreds of thousands.

Knock yourself out. He wouldn't tell me. I bet they're making board members of a company of that size make between $400,000 a million a year between cash and equity compensation. I bet they're each getting about a half a million a year. Yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep. Well, let me read you this fascinating sentence. It also shines a spotlight on the actual problem Facebook has grown too powerful and that the only fix is to get government legislators to come up with a way to allow more competition and take impossible decisions out of the hands of too few people. Until then, it'll be an endless and exhausting game of hot potato

in which no one wins. Good riddance to Trump. Hardly. Kara Swisher. Oh, you wrote that? I was going to say that. That's well said, my sister. Well said.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's exactly right. You nailed it. Yeah, he doesn't want to be an arbiter of the truth. Get the fuck out of the way, Mark, if you don't want to do that. Do what every other CEO does. We'll arbit. We'll arbit. Take responsibility. That's right. Yeah. He doesn't want to be an arbiter of the truth. Get the fuck out of the way, Mark, if you don't want to do that. Do what every other CEO does. We'll arbit. We'll arbit.

Take responsibility. That's right. Anyway. Anyway, all right. Let's move on. All right. Move on. All right.

Scott, it's time for a quick break. We'll be right back to talk about the issues at Peloton and a listener mail question. Fox Creative. This is advertiser content from Zelle. When you picture an online scammer, what do you see? For the longest time, we have these images of somebody sitting crouched over their computer with a hoodie on, just kind of typing away in the middle of the night. And honestly, that's not what it is anymore. That's Ian Mitchell, a banker turned fraud fighter.

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you can get closer to everything you love about city life in the all-new, reimagined Nissan Kicks. Learn more at www.nissanusa.com slash 2025 dash kicks. Available feature. Bose is a registered trademark of the Bose Corporation. Okay, Scott, we're back. After a year of huge success, Peloton is recalling all of its treadmill products. They're a little bit of duress to do it.

They went back and forth with the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission after reports of I think there was one death and several injuries. Peloton recommended a voluntary recall of Peloton products and apologized for not having complied with recommendations from the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission sooner. The recall affects over 125,000

treadmill owners. The CPSC has warned Peloton of their shoddy product last month. Shares of the company fell 14% following the news. Meanwhile, the pandemic lockdown loosens the gym and openings. You've noticed I've seen a lot of gym reopenings. It's unclear whether Peloton can sustain its success.

Peloton's 2020 revenue was 1.8 billion, also double what it was the year before. Talk about two things, Scott, from a crisis management perspective. What should they do here? They were a little bit, they have a very sunny brand feeling around them. This was a little obstreperous. And then secondly, what will happen after the pandemic? I am not going back to the gym. I'm done. I love Peloton, but go ahead. You tell me. Well, you just summarized it. 60% or 50% of people

said they're not going back to the gym or haven't gone back to the gym since they opened. And 60, I'm sorry, 60%, a survey of 2000 gym members, 60% did not return to gyms when they reopened in September, 2020. And unfortunately, 20% had stopped exercising altogether. The biggest comorbidity that no one wants to talk about because we politicize it is obesity. And unfortunately, the problem has even gotten worse during the pandemic. But as it relates to gyms, I mean, a question, I'll come back to Pelton in a second, but there is a learning here. Whenever I speak to boards of companies, one of the first questions I ask them, I say, well, what's happened to business in the last year? And they all say, well, usually business,

a lot of times business is down 20, 40, 60%. And I say, all right, the first questions I asked them, I said, well, what's happened to business in the last year? And they all say, well, you know, usually business, a lot of times business is down 20, 40, 60%. And I said, all right, the first question I want everyone to answer this, was this a secular or a cyclical shift? And that's very telling because a lot of people who are in denial always say it's a cyclical shift. Talk to someone who owns an office building and they say, people can't wait to get back to work. Yeah, they can't wait to get back to work two or three days a week, which means you're going to have a 40% destruction in demand, which flips this asset upside down because you're levered 80 to 90%. People are not going back to gyms in nearly the numbers they have. This has been dispersed to the home. Peloton is a juggernaut. And they almost got it perfectly right because it relates to crisis management. And this is true of

relationships too. Back really only three- Back to Bill Gates and your ongoing relationship with him, but go ahead. There's only three things you need to remember. The first is you have to acknowledge the problem. And that is you have to say, look, this is a huge issue. And they almost got that right. They really didn't acknowledge the issue

until they were sort of, it would have been perfect had they done it earlier because they've initially pushed back. So they get a D there, but they recovered very quickly. You gotta acknowledge the issue. The top guy or gal has to be the one seen addressing the issue. And the most important thing and the hardest thing to do,

the hardest thing to do is to over-correct. And they did that. They're recalling every item. They didn't try any of this bullshit. It's an isolated incident. They didn't try and play slow ball. They are recalling all of the treadmills. It's going to be very expensive. I think this is a near masterclass in crisis management. I think they have done a pretty much right thing. And by the

way, by the way, this is a fantastic strategy personally. When someone is upset at you, when your partner or business partner is really upset at you, your immediate reaction is to tear apart their argument and show them why they're wrong. When the reality is if they're upset, that's enough evidence that you need to do something, you need to acknowledge the problem and you need to overcorrect. I do the first.

We all do, it's a natural inclination. No, I really do the first. Don't be a fucking idiot, that's not that big a deal. You're always, you never spend any time with my father. You know, you just immediately start getting back into it, right? And the reality is, and what consumers and relationships love to forgive, they just want to know you care. You want to say, look, I didn't see it that way, but the fact that you're upset means I screwed up, and this is what I'm going to do, and I'm

going to overcorrect. I still want to buy one of these treads. I love them. They're wonderful, actually. I can't wait for the rowing machine. You know, I mean, it's just funny. I agree with you. I think it's a really, I think they handle it really well. I think they've got a lot of goodwill. I don't think they're in the position of a Zoom or, well, maybe Zoom's going to keep going. But certain things, like you saw Clubhouse drop off rather significantly. They went from millions of downloads to 900,000, like 10 million to 900,000.

You're going to see a lot of pandemic-related stuff change back, shift back a little bit. But some of them are absolutely secular. I don't see any reason with a Peloton to have to go to the gym, because I didn't really like the social aspect of it. I'd rather spend the money on a trainer or whatever, if I was spending much. But Peloton's very close to spend the money on a trainer or whatever if I was spending much, but Peloton's very close to being as good as a trainer. Yeah. And we have a tendency, if we want to process information or zero ones, we're either all going back to the office or we're all working

remote. And I think most people have a Peloton, still might go to Orange Theory every once in a while, still might go to the gym for yoga just to get out of the house. But again, the demand destruction at a gross level will be 30, 50, 70% for people who have figured out a way to work out with their body weight, with their mirror, with their Peloton at home. They like it. Even my mother-in-law said, can I bring my shoes so I can use the Peloton? I was like, you can use the Peloton anywhere it exists. It's interesting because they've got them in hotels. Oh, you so should have said, I'm sorry. I'm just not comfortable with you using my Peloton. And how long are you staying again?

That's what you should do. Just get things off on the right foot. And I'm sorry, how long are you staying again? I'm very busy. And you should get totally, we're like, also, this is going to sound weird. What detergent do you and Bob wash your clothes in? I have terrible allergies. Like, just lay down the law that this is not going to be a good weekend.

So you think they'll be fine, and they'll release things. We've talked about Apple buying. You've talked about dating services. This is a tech company with a—it's like Netflix to me. Like, I like Netflix. I feel like I have a relationship with Netflix. And I feel the same way with Peloton. It's very interesting.

But is it a moment when Apple comes in and buys it? Is it an opportunity for buying? Or should Peloton be like, no? We're starting to finish each other's sentences. This is my prediction. Okay. Have you seen the NPS on Peloton? No. The NPS on Peloton is some of the highest ever recorded for a company that has over a billion in revenue. That's because of Allie Love, but go ahead. Is that an instructor? Yes. Is that an instructor? I'm not discussing it with you. I do bottle service with Bill Gates.

Don't mock me. I love Allie Love. I've done Peloton twice and I hate it. She talks only to me, just so you know. Really? When we're working out, she's focused only on the character. Of course she does. Of course she does.

It feels like that. I can tell you that. Go ahead. Yeah. And you and when you're not massaging Bill Gates shoulders behind the stage at TED. Anyways. I do not touch Allie Love or Bill Gates. I just, I like Allie Love more than Bill Gates.

But anyway, go ahead. Sorry. Go ahead. Your prediction. We're already going to predictions? NPS scores. NPS scores. This is easy. This is easy. There has never been a stronger brand fit and a stronger,

more synergy than there is between Apple and Peloton. Apple, for every incremental minute of the most influential people in the world, which is who iOS caters to, they grow their market capitalization by 10 or $15 billion. If Apple today announced they were acquiring Peloton, their stock would go up by double or triple the acquisition amount. Apple could acquire Peloton right now for free because what do all these problems come down to? They all come down to supply chain. Who's got the best supply chain in the world? Apple. What two brands? I challenge you to think of two brands that in terms of value, connectedness, ease of use, elegance, high NPS, a nice kind of feminine progressive feel. Oh, okay, yeah.

What two brands are more in line with each other than Apple and Peloton? Agree, agree. This makes, and quite frankly, Apple probably said at $40 billion, we'd have to offer $60. That's just a little too much cabbage. And I bet Peloton was saying, well, no, we planned it. I bet this has been a somewhat humbling experience for Peloton. Why sell at all? Why not pivot into dating like you talked about or something else?

Because it's probably- Because occasionally, I think there's an incredible dignity. And I've always done this, and I think sometimes incorrectly. I think a company like Peloton could be just, I think they could own Connected Fitness with, if all of a sudden it was Appleton or what, Appleton or Peloton by Apple. You can call it Appleton. What, I don't know. Bridgerton. Bridgerton. Anyways, you get what I'm saying. And not only that, it's not a bad idea to ring the bell when you're trading at like 14 times revenues.

And they would get a premium. And this would be, I don't know. I think this is a company that they'll do well on their own. My prediction is it's going to be back over triple digits in the next 30 days. I think they'll be better with Apple. I agree with you. But in terms of a fit between two companies, I've never seen, it's hard for me to imagine a better fit. Apple needs to get into connected fitness. I don't know. I'm going to find out. I agree with you. I agree

with you. I'm thinking of writing about them this week because I think it's really interesting, like what's happening here. I don't think this is a negative at all, what's happened. I think it's terrible that someone died. No how they... Excuse me? Speed bump. Someone died, Scott. So, I do think... I didn't say that. I didn't say that the kid's death was a speed bump. You know what I mean. I know what you mean. I know what you mean. But I think that... I was saying it incorrectly.

I think it's something that is... they will recover from rather quickly. Yeah. Alright. Let's move on to listener mail. Roll tape. I can't believe I'm going to be a mailman. You. All right. Let's move on to listener mail. Roll tape. You've got, you've got, I can't believe I'm going to be a mailman. You've got mail. Hey, Karen, Scott, this is Cameron. And my question comes by way of Oxford, England. I'm wondering your thoughts on the future of AI ethics

and the role of big tech. The high profile and controversial firings of Timnit Jabrou and Margaret Mitchell, the previous co-leads of Google's ethical AI team, are raising questions about academic integrity in big tech's AI research. This is culminating in the campaign hashtag RecruitMeNot, in which students and researchers like myself pass on working at Google. Do these events simply indicate poor judgment on the higher-ups at Google, or a deeper problem in how AI research is conducted at large tech companies? Let me know. Love the show. Well, that's a great question, Cameron. That's a fantastic question. That hashtag is really interesting. I think it's very similar to what Scott was just talking about Facebook.

I think a lot of these committees are big leaves for these companies. They're going to do what they want with a technology that's critical to their future. Scott? I think they get to hire and fire who they want. And unless they've broken the law around discrimination or wrongful termination, they get to fire who they want. I think, quite frankly, they set themselves up for failure by creating a title called AI ethical. I mean, I just think the whole thing's kind of. Yeah.

What I was saying, it's a fig leaf kind of thing. They do. They're trying to say they're concerned about these issues, which are concerning, by the way. But they don't, you're right. They did set themselves up for failure that they were never going to make people who care about ethics happy because it goes against some of their businesses. And so putting them inside of these companies, to me, is always an error. There should be outside independent bodies that study this stuff and make recommendations and put pressure on these companies.

Journalists should be doing it. Regulators should be doing it. And inside a company, just like even though the Facebook board is supposed to be independent, it's not. It doesn't feel like it. You can't buy your own Supreme Court. You just can't. And this is sort of a version of that.

I think it's, a lot of times it's in good faith. They're trying to like, but a lot of it is PR and signaling and keeping people quiet. I think the job of this stuff is done by regulators, the press, and groups that pressure, even hashtags. Well, so I remember in the 90s, I used to, probably the coolest project I ever got, right out of business school in my 20s, I was asked to sit in the board meetings of Levi Strauss and Company and then just stand up and provide feedback. And I remember thinking they had a quote unquote head of international.

I'm like, if you have a head of international, it means you're not an international business. They were always the dumb ones, but go ahead. And it's like when Pinterest had, I think, didn't Pinterest have a head of diversity and inclusion and they ended up- They all did. But if you have to have that,

you're just setting yourself up for failure and AI, you know, AI, calling colleagues, it's like in business schools, we now have departments of ethics and leadership and diversity and inclusion. You know why? Because every day at universities, we administrators ask ourselves the same questions over and over. We try and answer one key question, Karen, and that is, how do we pay ourselves more while decreasing our accountability? I know, let's create a center on leadership so there's nothing measurable to- I do think there should be ethics discussion. Oh my God.

There should be like a class. Oh, no, no, you're wrong on this. There should, it should be part of an education. I can't control my 10-year-old. I'm going to tell a 28-year-old how to be ethical? No, no, not how to be ethical, to talk about it, to like studies different ethical things, to discuss. There are every corporation has social issues they have to deal with.

We just talked about this last week with Basecamp. People have to be ready. Part of the reason Mark Zuckerberg is bad at this is because he never took a philosophy course. He never took a good, he left college before he got some background. I think it's important as part of, and just the way they do it with doctors. They do the same thing. There has to be some element of philosophy and deeper things within the educational system. I didn't say telling them what to do, talking about what the many thorny issues are. In this

case, it does not belong inside a company. It just will not work. The people will be fired. There'll be all kinds of sturm und drang about it. People will be shocked, shocked, shocked that they behave like this. It's often women and people of color who are leading these teams, diversity teams or whatever. The numbers will remain the same. Everyone will be mad. And that's the problem. There's lack of any kind of progress in this area is what makes people furious.

And it has to come from pressure from outside and persistent and constant pressure. And then inside people sending Kara Swisher memos about what's really going on. Thank you. I think that was well said. I'm still sticking with my guns though, that whenever we bring in some, what I call FIP, formerly important person to run a center at a business school, it's like, well, okay, let's increase costs. Let's pass it along to students in the form of debt and let's have no measurable outcomes that result in why we're here, and that's to help them create economic security for them and their families. But anyways, I think church, your parents, undergrad, as you said, philosophy courses

are what are supposed to shape a person. By the time they get to business school, Jesus Christ. Anyway. In any case, I've been asked to do things like that, and I'm always like, oh, you want the prominence of me without any real effect. It doesn't have any effect. It's a waste of my time. That's what I feel like sometimes when I've been asked to do things like this.

You know what the most effective, I think the most effective thing around leadership is occasionally we bring in some guy. Then it's always a guy that went to prison for 10 years for insider trading. It's kind of a scared straight thing. Oh, yeah. Remember scared straight? They don't do that anymore. I think that's really. I scared straight thing oh yeah remember they don't do that that's really i don't think yeah they don't yeah i think that's actually pretty effective it didn't scare me straight obviously oh i get it i get it scared gay i i remember that it felt so

i wasn't right i even at the time i was like okay we're bringing in essentially people of color to yell at a bunch of white kids, in my school at least. And it was weird. That was weird. I just had a weird high school memory. Anyway, I agree. This has got to be done from the outside. I would rather be on the outside throwing stones at the inside and getting revelations and things like that from people there to see how it works. And then put it all out.

And if people don't like it, there's pressure on the company, shareholders, business, things like that. That's how it should work. But there should be, by the way, again, Congress needs to act around AI, facial recognition. I did a great interview with Joy Boulamwini at MIT. All she did is she just showed it off what was happening. Much more effective than any 20 groups of people inside of any company. You know, she just said, here's all my research with a thousand faces. Apparently facial recognition doesn't know black people exist. And here's how. And then they made changes.

And that's how it worked. So there you have it. All right, Scott, one more quick break. We'll be back for predictions. Support for this podcast comes from Anthropic. You already know that AI is transforming the world around us, but lost in all the enthusiasm and excitement is a really important question. How can AI actually work for you?

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I should. I'm not. I don't know what it is. It's because you didn't have enough time fun at the rave. That's what it is. You're wondering why you're not a rave. I need to start dating this woman called Molly. She makes me very happy.

Actually, just today, there were some reports about how it helps PTSD. There's a lot of really promising stuff Oh, and depression. Promising stuff. To get beyond the opiates. This is a way to do it. Lots of tech people, if they're going to do anything good for the world, this is going to be at the funding of all this research, real research around it to get it approved for people.

I'm absolutely going back to Tulum and doing a bunch of Molly just for the good of the world. Don't hug me. Don't do it in front of me because you'll try to hug me and that will end badly for you. You so badly want to hug the dog. I't hug me. Don't do it in front of me because you'll try to hug me and that will end badly for you. She's so badly want to hug the dog. I really don't.

Twitter knows you love me. Twitter knows you love me. There's not even a moment that I think about hugging you. All right. You predicted Dogecoin was going to spike you and Rebecca bought some. Of course, I did not. When Elon is on SNL this week, how is your Dogecoin doing? It's gone up, I think.

And will you be watching? Elon Musk will be on Saturday Night Live this weekend for people who don't. As is the case with all crypto. I said I was going to buy it.

I planned to buy it and I did not buy it and it's up. I really can't handle this. Okay. I was thinking about, as a joke, I was going to put,

you know, a decent amount of money into Dogecoin and do this whole thing, Dogcoin. And if we'd done that, I'd be flying back to Tulum right now in my G-fucking-650. I mean, it's just crazy what has happened here. But I think all of this is— You still have time.

And the thing is, well, I've tempered my comments because I'm worried about someone accusing me of being what I am, and that is old. Yeah. And also angry that I missed out. comments because I'm worried about someone accusing me of being what I am, and that is old, and also angry that I missed out. And I have an entrenched interest in the existing infrastructure around the markets because I've done well with the current. But I think this is really scary. I don't think that invented currencies by people who claim it's a joke, and now it's worth more than FedEx. Do you realize that the market capitalization of Dogecoin is now greater than Moderna? Yeah. So, I wonder, and also, I just don't like the- People are playing the speculation, just like they did with GameStop. That's what's going,

it's the speculation. 100%. And I just don't like the notion that one individual can move markets like this. I think it's really – I don't think that ends well. So, we'll see. I'm planning on – when I gamble in Vegas, I take a certain amount of money. I put on a kilt. I am so much fun to roll with in Vegas, by the way. Okay.

I totally – So, it's going to be Molly, kilts, and Vegas for us. Okay. All right. I am awesome in Vegas. All right. I'll go to Vegas with you in a kilt. You know,

we'll invite Mark Cuban. He's a lot of fun. But go ahead. Yeah, he would be a lot of fun. He is a lot of fun. Mark Cuban would be great. Anyway,

so I go there. I'm going to do the same thing as SNL and I've got, I'm doing, what is it, Uniswap or Binance and,

or Van, I forget, I've signed up to basically play Doja Coin during SNL. You and I will live tweet. Okay. But the thing is we got front run. My big insight around Doja Coin spiking

during Saturday Night Live, everyone, the markets are smarter than me and anticipated that and Doja Coin is up, Jesus Christ, it was up 25% yesterday. I just, I can't get over this thing. I absolutely can't get over it. It reminds me in the- And then sell it Saturday night, right?

Or something, Sunday. Yeah, I think I'm selling it by the time we hit weekend update because that's when everyone will kind of go to sleep, right? Yeah. I go to sleep after weekend update. All right. In any case, do you think it'll be funny?

Elon Musk? Or it will be like awkward. It's either going to be really awkward. There'll be a lot of marriage. I think I'll bring like the charm of Peyton Manning and the good looks of Donald Trump. I'm trying to think of two guests to triangulate off of. I'm going to go opposite. I think it's going to be very funny.

You think it's going to be hilarious? I do. He's a... You know him. I don't. You like him. You know, one time he showed up at a meeting with a stuffed monkey, and he made me laugh. It just made me laugh.

In front of a very important person. It was a harembe or whatever, and he kept playing with the monkey during this interview with this very important person, and I just thought it was hysterical. He's a quirky man, I would say. I just think he might be funny. I don't know. We'll see. I think every SNL issue is really more about the writers than it is about the— And occasionally you get really, really shocked.

Who's the—gosh, the one woman was incredible who dated—oh, she's an incredible singer. Oh, gosh. Miley Cyrus is on this weekend. Yeah. This woman hosted, and she was fantastic at doing impersonations. Oh, what is her name? Adele? She dated Pete Davidson. Not Adele. Yeah, this woman hosted and she was fantastic at doing impersonations. Oh, what is her name? Adele? She dated Pete Davidson?

No, not Adele. Oh, Ariana Grande. Ariana Grande. Oh, Ariana. She was so, you occasionally find, wow, this individual is so talented

beyond just a great voice. Anyways, we'll see. I'm tuning in. I hate myself for tuning in, but I'm tuning in. All right, we'll see how it goes and how your Dogecoin, I'm sorry you didn't buy any.

I believe, Rebecca, you bought some, right? Yeah, I did. I had to go apologize to every tech bro I've ever dated and be like, you're right. I bought some Dogecoin at the end of the day. Humiliating. So Rebecca is going to score while you did not, Scott. Well, you were slow, too slow, dancing unhappily in Tulum. Rebecca was there. Thank you, Rebecca. Okay, Scott. I don't know if it's related, but Rebecca just handed in her notice and has bought a Tango Clinic in Buenos Aires. I don't know if the two are related.

I don't know if the two are related. Okay, Scott. On that note, I did not buy any Dogecoin, nor did I say I was going to. I like to miss every financial turn I can. I like to buy at the top. I like to buy at the top.

I like to buy at the top. You know, my grandfather was not a big investor, although he did rather well for someone who emigrated from Italy. And I once asked him about the stock market, and I said, you know, how do you think about the stock market? He goes, it'll go up or it'll go down. And that was his answer. There you go. There you go. I was like, okay, thank you.

I thought that was wise. It was very wise. Yeah. All right. Don't forget, if you have a. I thought that was wise. It was very wise. Yeah. All right. Don't forget, if you have a story in the news that you want to hear our opinion on, submit your questions to nymag.com slash pivot. Do not ask about the Facebook oversight board because Scott has had enough until he has taken Molly, and then we will have a delightful discussion on that issue.

Scott, can you read us out? Today's show was produced by Rebecca Sinanis. Ernie Intertod engineered this episode. Ernie's back, back in the house, the E-man. Thanks also to Hannah Rosen and Drew Burrow. Make sure you're subscribed to the show on Apple Podcasts, or if you're an Android user, check us out on Spotify, or frankly, wherever you listen to podcasts.

If you like the show, please recommend it to a friend. Thanks for listening to Pivot from Vox Media. We'll be back next week for another breakdown of all things tech and business. Divorce needs a rebranding, Cara. Okay. It needs a rebranding. What do you want to call it?

You and I are consciously coupling. No, no. We're consciously coupling. I'm staying married, and I'm going to uncouple in a minute. Oh, the big weekend. Good luck with the weekend with Amanda's parents. Could you take off your shoes, please, before you come into the house? Say that before they come in.

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