Pivot - Facebook says it’s all about privacy now. OK, sure.

Episode Date: March 8, 2019

Kara and Scott are back! They talk about Zuckerberg's supposed shift towards more privacy on Facebook and, well, we'll believe it when we see it. Meanwhile Congress is ramping up its efforts on shaking up how we think of antitrust and big tech companies. They get into what they expect to talk and hear about at South by Southwest this week. If you're looking to learn more about all things Facebook check out our friend Casey Newton's newsletter The Interface. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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and reporting tools that get your marketing running seamlessly, all backed by their expert live customer support. It's time to get going and growing with Constant Contact today. Ready, set, grow. Go to ConstantContact.ca and start your free trial today. Go to ConstantContact.ca for your free trial. ConstantContact.ca. Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher. Scott, where are you? Rebecca Q. the Wagner. That's right.

A quick shout out to my dozens and dozens of messages. Bitches, I am back. Oh, my God. Liberating you from thoughtful conversation. Interesting credible guests that have polluted this show for the last 14 days to tell you two things. One, I'm too

back. That's right. That's right, ladies and gentlemen. The big dog has returned with one word and one word only. Woof! Oh my god, Scott. Too much, Kara? Really?

Come on. Too much? It shows a slight amount of insecurity that you're using Wagner. All right, let's talk about end-to-end encryption. You might have gone with Eminem or someone like that, but nonetheless, here we are. Apocalypse Now. Apocalypse Now. We got to get to the news.

Come on. You were lying around on vacation or whatever the hell you were doing. We have things to talk about. Things have been going on. Things to talk about. First of all, Facebook apparently has discovered privacy and has decided to become Snapchat. That's what I understand from Mark Zuckerberg's recent blog post or whatever, one of his new blog posts. What do you think?

Kara, how come I feel lied to here? I mean, let's be honest. You could give a shit about privacy. If you found out someone had syphilis and could sell it to LaRoche for a penny, he'd say, I'm not going to do that. I need to find out 100 million people who have syphilis so I can make real money. What are you hearing? You're dialed in here.

You couldn't use any example but syphilis. You really could have. It's a great word, isn't it? Couldn't he like soccer or something like that? Enjoys kombucha? You say soccer. I say syphilis. Okay.

Let's call the whole thing off. All right. Here's what's going on. Mark Zerber wrote a post. He said that he suddenly has discovered, oh, my goodness, people like privacy. I've done a little reporting, reportage on this, and from what I can understand, they have seen the data, and it is not good for what Facebook does for a living, which is public postings and all kinds of things. People have been put off by that, and he's discovered that Snapchat seems to be what people want, so he's going to give them Snapchat except the Facebook version and really stress and integrate all the different services, Instagram, WhatsApp, Facebook.

I think it's all for the glory of Facebook, and the others are going to be leeched at, the ones who are popular, which were already doing that. Instagram, Kevin's sister, Smartly, had really leaned heavily into stories before he left. And most people feel that if I've talked to is that they're essentially acknowledging that their main business is problematic, is problematic and eventually troubled because the data, Mark does everything based on data. And the data is telling him this

is the way to go. And so I thought that his post would add a lot more credibility if he'd been up front and said, this is how we're going to make money. Any thoughts on what this means in terms of the business model? Well, there's two things. One is it would be nice if he admitted they had problems with privacy. Like he said, we are the problem, and so we have decided this. But he doesn't care. You're right.

He doesn't care. Again, he focuses on the data. Every decision he makes is based on data, I think. And as nice as he is personally, I think he doesn't care, you're right. Or hasn't thought of it, at least, which is the kind way of doing it. I think what they're trying to do is trying to be WeChat now.

Because messaging really works. Messaging and communications. And he's always tried to mush messaging and social media together, and they're not the same thing. And so now, that post essentially said to me, social media is a little fucked, and messaging is great. And so it's very different.

And that's one thing Snapchat has always said. Communications is very different, and they have really leaned into it. The problem is they're small, they're super innovative and inventive, and Facebook has stolen pretty much all their good ideas. But they were correct in directionality. And so I think they're trying to go into the WeChat, Snapchat kind of direction from what I can tell. And so WeChat makes plenty of money doing that. And so that's what I, it's going to be a tough thing, but they did it before with mobile. They weren't in mobile and then they were. So I think that's what's going on here. Yeah, there's so much here

and you touched on the macro factors that the world is heading towards messaging and I'm sure your kids have been told this. Oh, my kids don't use Facebook at all. They use Snapchat and they sometimes use Instagram stories, but not that much because they don't like them. They think they're performative, but they definitely like private messaging quite a bit and with a group of people, but private. Yeah, because they're told over and over that everything's going on your permanent record if you don't. That's not why. I think they just like it. You know, but you don't think they've been lectured to that be very careful about publicity. I think they value, they're actually. I think they like it. I think, I think Evan Spiegel was right. People

like to use it this way. I think, you I think you can watch them use it really carefully and they use it as a communications tool and an entertainment tool at the same time. But they could just as easily use an open format. I think they see the value in ensuring the ephemeral nature of something and that it goes away and that it can be a little bit more irresponsible and be young. bit more irresponsible and be young. So the economic, there's a lot here. One, I think it helps them, if you will, continue to abdicate responsibility around content because they won't see this stuff. If Mianna Marie's military start putting out content that motivates people to do horrible things, they can say, well, not our bad. Well, if they allow those private messages to be large, they have pulled back on that. Sometimes the private messaging platforms can only be so many people. They're not going to allow it to be 100,000 people.

They're definitely walking away from the public part of Facebook, it looks like. The other – and I think there's two other things. The other thing is – and I think this is the most dangerous thing that's not being reported about – is that they're trying to aggregate all three apps into one sort of seamless messaging or communications platform that covers 2.7 billion people that would be increasingly difficult to untangle, thereby potentially circumventing antitrust, which I think is sort of a long – Oh, I hadn't thought of that. Smart, Scott. There you go. I'm here for a reason.

I think that's really – you're absolutely right. I think one of the things – someone who knows a lot about this was like – it looks like Zuckerberg is sort of – you know how the captain goes down with the ship? He's not going to go down with the ship. He's going to get off the ship and find a new ship and leave all the other billions on board. You know what I mean? It was a real abdication of his business in a weird way to another direction. And he's within his rights to do that. But I do think they've realized and seen the data that their business is not one that's going to continue

in the way it's been perpetrated by them. Well, and to be clear, and, you know, I do believe he's a broken sociopath, but he's also a genius business person. And this is where it's headed. Yep. He's like Bill Gates. I think that, actually, I think Bill's a very decent man.

I agree, but he's like him. Well, you didn't know Bill back in the day. I'm just telling you, he's that way. William? Yes. Because I'm so young. No, he's not a pleasant character. Not a pleasant guy.

Anyway, and then I think the third leg of the stool here is that you mentioned WeChat. The one thing the Chinese platforms have done really well is integrating payments into their platforms. And this encryption and then this talk of a Facebook currency slash Facebook coin, you can – We'll talk about that. In the future. Explain that to the people. It's really interesting. I think it's probably the most underreported story, and that is Facebook is talking about a coin that would be different than Bitcoin, because Bitcoin is essentially a currency, and a currency is when two parties agree that something is worth something.

So you can have a fiat currency where you agree this green piece of paper actually is a store of value. it as having dozens or even hundreds of currencies deposited to back up this coin, such that if you potentially see something you like on Instagram, you could literally just sort of double click it and it's on its way. And the two biggest frictions I think in technology from a consumer standpoint are one, are very mundane. One is charging. Charging is like the bane of my existence. And then two, payments.

It's very difficult to transfer money securely. It's very difficult to transfer money securely. It's very difficult to pay for something. You know, I hate – I'm flying down to Florida last night. I pull up whatever it is, GoGo on Delta. And the hassle is putting in your credit card, getting it wrong, the CBC number. I pay with miles. It really is a tax. You don't pay with miles.

You pay with miles? I do. That's just strange. I have so many miles. I fly everywhere. Go ahead. Give them away. No have so many miles. I fly everywhere. Go ahead. Give them away. No, not to you.

I need it. I'm backed out. How do I get to Austin? They're trying to. We're going to talk about that in a minute. So they're going to create a currency. They want to jack you into their system, essentially. Yeah, which is really exciting because when I think about someone I'd like to have greater control over the global economy, it's Mark Zuckerberg and Sheryl Sandberg.

So this is – but it's really frightening. This is a Mark production, as they say, is when he had it on the bottom. I think this is all Mark because it's all data-oriented. I think it's completely – this is a Mark production. So there's a lot here. There's moving to – skating to where the puck is in terms of private messaging. There's payments. There's continuing to be able, in my view,

abdicate responsibility around any sort of editorial control over the content. And there's potentially moving to kind of a seamless global currency or payment platform. So again, I think this is a genius business move. And quite frankly, just really fucking frightening. I think this company has way too much control. And should be – another reason why it should be broken up. Or maybe they can't do it.

Look what happened to Bill Gates. Remember when he all of a sudden discovered security after having the Swiss cheese of a software platform? Oh, security. People like security and Apple have been doing it forever. And then suddenly he got – or the same – when Bill Gates got the internet. Oh, the internet. Not these close – it's a very, he's very similar. I'm writing a conference, I'm going to talk about this.

It's very similar to a Gatesian move, and Gates is always well known as the best businessman, not the most visionary person, and somewhat, you know, he had for a long time that malevolent kind of figure. Yeah, but I think the move, or the outside intervention that changed the world as it relates to Microsoft was the DOJ moving in on them in 1999. So let's talk about that because I think that's really smart. They mush them together so they can't take them apart. Who was hired, just hired by – in Congress on a congressional panel that oversees antitrust, Lena Kahn.

Explain for the people who she is, Scott. You love Lena Kahn. I do. You love Lena Kahn? I do. She's brilliant. You love Lena Kahn. I do.

Do you love Lena Kahn? I do. She's brilliant. She's a gangster lawyer who, as a law student at Yale, published kind of the seminal piece saying we need to get away from this consumer test or pricing as the litmus test. Consumer harm as evidenced by pricing as the means of determining antitrust and go back to this Brandeisian notion of sort of more power in the channel. And, I mean, she has had a huge impact. Did you just say Brandezian?

Brandezian, isn't that what it's called? The old Brandezian approach to antitrust? Yes, that is right. So explain what that means. It's a different look at things. Because you cannot show consumer harm because Amazon works so well, for example, or Google is so great. You can't show consumer harm as easily, which is one of the tests.

It's more about powering the channel and if you're suppressing competition, regardless of what happens to the end consumer. Right. And that used to be the antitrust test. And I think we're headed back there because it's impossible to really do consumer harm test, one, when the end product is free,

and two, we're in this unusual trope of an environment where there are certain companies that are able to become the most valuable companies in the world, especially Amazon, without ever getting to meaningful profitability, meaning they can soak up market share by continuing to offer lower and lower in prices without ever having to compete fairly, so to speak.

Well, I do want to get into this everything subsidized, like IPOs for Uber and Lyft and stuff like that. It's all about that. So this is a big deal, and Silicon Valley is super shook up by this, I think. And they should be because antitrust, she's a coming. She's a coming, and she is not pleased about the situation. And I think it will be interesting. Speaking of which, I will be interviewing Amy Klobuchar at South by Southwest where you are also coming.

And that's a big thing for her. She's also on the antitrust committees and has talked about these issues, and has certainly, aside from all the comb stuff and all the boss stuff, she's quite adept at some of this. One of her pillars of her presidential bid is to regulate tech. Yeah, and maybe you've heard more than I have,

but my sense is they're all sort of jumping on this notion of power is bad and the concentration of power among big tech is something we need to look at. But I haven't heard any of them really outline what they mean by that. Is it antitrust? Is it FTC? Is it DOJ? And by the way, lean is just sort of the tip of the iceberg here in terms of some of these immunities. I think 2019 could arguably be referred to as the year, hopefully, that immunities are kicking in. Because not only is Lena Kahn going to work for Congress, the FTC has set up a 12-person subcommittee to look at antitrust. We see France, and unfortunately, we don't really have time to get into the story, but France has passed legislation saying, all right, big tech, we give

up. Your tax lawyers are smarter than our tax authorities, and we're going to charge you 3% of top-line revenue, which I think is a really interesting move, and we're going to charge you three percent of top line revenue which i think is a really interesting move and we're going to see more of it yep around the globe but there's a lot going on but i haven't seen a candidate yet really say x y and z this is how we would break up facebook or i am going to ask this of klobuchar because she's on the she's a significant person on a significant committee who has talked about these issues so she's well that's one of the questions i'm going to ask her. What should I, should I ask her? I'm going to tell you who I'm interviewing and then you and I are going to be a pivot at South by Southwest. That's right, live in front of a studio audience. With a lot of barbecue in our face kind of thing. There you go.

So I'm, I'm going to go through them. Give me a question. Klobuchar, do not say comb. So the thing that bothers me most about Senator Klobuchar, what I would want to know is, is not the comb or being angry or being a bit of a jerk. It's like, OK, there's a lot of people who have that reputation in positions of leadership. The thing I found most disturbing about those reports is that she actually got in the way of people's careers when they decided to leave the office, that she was vindictive and purposely tried to. Parentally too. Yeah, make it difficult for them to get the next better job. And I think there's a general code among bosses and leaders that when young people leave your organization,

you err towards trying to help them. And I think it's a very poor reflection on her character. That's a really good question. I'd want to know. It's one thing to be a jerk. It's one thing to be mean. But are you vindictive? Because that's just not the kind of character. That's a great question.

We have enough of that in the White House. We need a change here. Vindictive. He doesn't seem to have control of anyone who leaves. They end up writing books about him and what an idiot he is. So he can tweet at them. The second one is Kathy Griffin who got into a mess of trouble with putting that tweet on the internet and that photo of Trump's head. It was a comical thing but people were quite offended by it.

That was her – that's what she said. So I'm interviewing her and she has a new documentary about what happened. You're interviewing Kathy Griffin? Yeah. Yes. There's a new documentary about her, about – I forget what it's called. But she was essentially canceled. She was canceled after the one thing and it went crazy on social media.

I've always thought she was quite a talented stand-up. She's funny. She's fearless. She's fearless. So, what shall I ask her? Oh, I don't know. She got canceled and no one, others didn't. It was really interesting.

She's just funny. Just what's life like or who else? God, you got to get interesting. Wait, let me finish. I'm not even done. I want a question for Kathy Griffin and then Marguerite Vestager. Not as funny. Oh, Marguerite Vestager?

Will she hang with Scott? She's my hero. I saw her on the train. I said hi. You can hang out with me on Sunday. I know her pretty well. My question for Marguerite Vestager is what is she doing next?

What does she want? What would be the ideal next thing for her? Because she's leaving. Yeah, I don't know. Something her. Yeah, I don't know. Something. Kathy Griffin, I don't know. Favorite, God, I don't know, favorite TV. Would she do it again?

She's just an interesting, funny person. So that's three. Who else? Any other panels or anything else? I have you. I've got Arlen Hamlin. I've got Wendy Davis. Wow.

I've got so much to go. I've got lots of stuff. And we have the Vox Media House. Wait till you see it. And my kids are coming. You're going to much to go. I've got lots of stuff. And we have the Vox Media House. Wait till you see it. And my kids are coming. You're going to meet my sons. No kidding. And if you give me any trouble, they're very large young men, and they will deal with you in the correct manner.

There you go. You're bringing both your kids. Both my sons, yeah. Yeah, my son's looking at UT. My son is looking at my old son. UT Austin. Yeah, yeah. Awesome school.

I'm going on a college trip with my friends. That's great. Yeah, you can't come to that. But it's going to be fun. Vox has a cool house, Vox Media at the Belmont Theater. And we have all kinds of stuff. We've got video games. We've got mattresses on the ground.

We've got music. We've got all kinds of stuff. You're going to enjoy it. It's really lovely. I'm excited. Maybe we'll wander over to the New York Times one nearby, which is also I get to go to. There you go. Yeah.

So, all right, wins and fails. Wins and fails. All right. Well, we do that after we take a break. We're going to take a quick break, and then we get back to go to. There you go. Yeah. So, all right, wins and fails. Wins and fails. All right, well, we do that after we take a break. We'll take a quick break, and then we get back to our show. 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

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since you've been away? You can do stuff since when you were away, too, if you want. Oh, since I've been away? Okay. So, my win, if we're going to go all the way back, is a guy who moves around with a walker but stands 10 feet tall, Elijah Cummings. I thought he had one of the great moments of the last year. I just thought he had

incredible gravitas. You know, the biggest loser obviously of that uh hearing um hands down was the guy who decided to put a black woman up as a prop and to prove someone isn't racist i thought that was not only racist but just generally just ridiculously stupid yeah um yeah the saturday night live had a good skit on that and then winner who are your losers uh who are your winners and losers? And then I have a win. Oh, gosh. I just – I do feel that that hearing – I think Trump is not doing really well.

But you never know with him. He's like Teflon in a lot of ways. So I don't know. He just seems to have lost here and there. And his social media stuff is sort of petering out. He does something crazy on social media. Everyone is like, oh, is he yelling again over there on Twitter? So I think there's some bit of – just as what happened when his show started to lag.

And again, as you know, I watched every single episode of The Apprentice. You got tired of it. You're like, oh, stop talking. And so I think – maybe he'll gin it up again. But I think people are tired of being in an outrage over whatever he says next. So we'll see. And I think the Democrats might have overextended with all their subpoenas. We'll see.

And what about, tell me, you had, giving credit where it's due, you had the best prediction of the last month, and that is the day before Amazon pulled out. You actually predicted that. What do you think of this letter that's been circulated by Cuomo and all these business leaders in New York asking for them to come back? Trying to get them back? Yeah. They're not coming back. Yeah.

That's not Jeff Bezos' way. No way. I agree. He does not suffer fools. I'll tell you that. That is one thing about him. And it's one thing I like about him. But I don't see how they could be pulled back.

And think of the controversy if they came back, what they'd have to give them. And, you know, they're better off doing what they're doing. And, you know, again, as you know, I thought the whole thing was a circus. So, you know, it would be nice for them to have a thing. They should just open something up just like Google has a big thing near Chelsea Market and Netflix has a big office in New York. They should just have one. Like, stop.

It's no big deal. They have a big – they should have one in Washington. They should have maybe one in the Midwest perhaps. But this idea of multiple HQs is kind of insane as far as I can tell. I don't know. Just, you know, I did the math here. So supposedly 25,000 jobs for $3 billion.

So at L2, we created 150 high-paying jobs, which I believe entitles me to $19 million. So with 19 million bucks, I've literally thought about this. I think you should wait for Cuomo to show up or de Blasio. Well, okay. I don't think it's that – people laugh, but I don't think it's that outrageous. Small business creates two-thirds of the jobs in America. I agree.

I agree. You should get $19 million. And I figured it out. The cement helipad costs $150,000. I'm putting mine on the top of faculty housing, and we're a union, so let's assume it costs a million. Do you have a helicopter? Well, I've been looking at them on control. I can get an Airbus A340 for about $3 million because I'm not greedy.

I just want a dual-engine Roto helicopter. So I've got $4 million. So that leaves me $15 million, which will get me a Chipotle pulled pork burrito bowl for the next 134 years. So where's my helipad and my burrito bowl? I've created these jobs. And by the way, Tim Cook's not running around with his handout. Apple's creating jobs. He's not. That's what I mean.

He's an adult. Google's doubling the number of jobs in New York. They don't have their handout. So Bezos, you know, finger off the camera and hand back in your pocket, boss. I know it's true. Stop it. Tasteless as ever. There you go. International travel does not change. I am who I am, Karen. You know, it's true. Stop it. Tasteless as ever. There you go.

International travel does not change. I am who I am. You know, it's interesting. I'm going to be having Gavin Newsom at UROS coming to the Code Conference in June, so we can ask him about this kind of stuff. Like he's, you know, he has a state that has a lot of the tech, and it'll be an interesting question is how do you – I'd love to know his thoughts on the Cuomo situation.

So I have a Gavin Newsom story. They both have good hair. In 1995, I thought I was going to be crazy rich. I started an internet company, and all the bankers were telling me. I was like, oh, it's going to be suicide. Oh, well, if I'm going to be super rich, it means I'm super important, and I should run for office. So I started talking to people in local politics

about running for supervisor in San Francisco, and I went to this forum, and I met this guy who had just become, or was running for supervisor named Gavin Newsom. And I shook his hand. I looked at him and talked to him like, that's it. There's no fucking way I could ever be anything. This guy, I mean, literally this was like 20 years ago. And I remember meeting this guy and going,

I don't know what this guy's going to do, but it's going to be impressive. It's like, okay, he's super smart. I really like Gavin. Super articulate and tall and handsome. Beautiful skin. Oh, my gosh. The whole nine yards. Wow.

In that way, he's flawless. He's actually a really interesting and complex person. Complex because he was banging his campaign manager's wife? What makes him complex? You know what, Scott? What makes him complex? Fair banging his campaign manager's wife? What makes him complex? You know what, Scott? What makes him complex? Fair but for the grace of God. What makes him complex?

I'm just saying, well, his current wife and 17 children. He's like, my brother, oddly enough, here's a weird thing. I shouldn't have said that. My brother's been the anesthesiologist for his 19 children or whatever at the hospitals in California that he goes to. My brother's been his anesthesiologist for his 19 children. That's the whitest thing ever said. My brother's been his anesthesiologist for— That's the whitest thing ever said. My brother's been his anesthesiologist for his children.

Well, that's what he just is. It's not his. His wife's when they have the babies. Anyway, that's TMI. But nonetheless, he's a lovely guy, and it'll be an interesting questions. He's turned his life around. Let's just give him—

I'm not sure it ever needed turning around, and there's a couple speed bumps like you. Yes, there are. He's turned his life around. Let's just give Gavin a go. I'm not sure it ever needed turning around. There's a couple speed bumps like you. Yes, there are. But look, Trump does that every, like, it's Wednesday for Trump. So don't even start. Gavin Newsom, when he does bad things, it makes him more complex. Yeah, but you know, the person in question

that happened to him, they all said, it's fine. So let's just let them, it's not like hooked up into Roger Stone and payments and Michael Cohen. There's not like hooked up into Roger Stone and payments and Michael Cohen. There's not like that going on. Let's talk about Gavin. I don't know if people ever want to talk about politics, but I can't resist. Why wouldn't Governor of California, tall, handsome,

smart, complex, as you put it, why wouldn't he be mentioned more often as a candidate for president? He's not going to run. He said it. He said it. He might someday, but he's not going to run now. By the way, speaking of friends, a it already. He might someday, but he's not going to run now. Yeah, by the way, speaking of friends, a friend of mine from business school, a really impressive woman, Eleni Sokolos, is the lieutenant governor. Oh, great.

That's great. Well, I will be forever in his debt for doing the gay marriage thing when it was very unpopular. Yeah, illegal. He did it when it was illegal. Let me just say, leadership. Leadership, leadership, leadership. When someone does that at a time where it really hurts them, I'm going to be very loyal in that regard. And I'm not an identity politics person.

I just showed leadership. Good. And I really appreciated that. So a win. I just want to get out there another win. Well, last one. All right. I don't know if you felt this way.

We're about the same age. I was actually quite sad when I heard about Luke Perry. And I don't know why. I was trying to figure out why do I care about Luke Perry. And I don't know why. I was trying to figure out, why do I care about Luke Perry? And he seemed like a decent guy, part of my youth at least, watching 90210. Also, he was in a movie that if you have Netflix called Normal Life with Ashley Judd, it was actually a pretty good movie. Wow.

And I just felt bad for the guy. And then the other guy I heard about that really sort of made me sad was to hear about Alex Trebek is suffering from pancreatic cancer. Very late stage too. So, you know, pulling for you for a hundred, Alex Trebek. Nice man. Infinitely Canadian.

You know, I don't know if you're aware of this, but I wrote a very, it's become a very popular column in the Times this week. Of course it is. Of course it is. There it is. I don't know if you know this, but I write what has become a very popular column.

It was. No, I wrote about my stroke. And my brother's an anesthesiologist. But not every one of my columns. Listen, when I write about internet bylaws, it's not popular even though I write about it. I write about issues international. But when I wrote about my stroke, I got dozens and dozens of people having a similar thing, many of whom survived, some of whom had people that didn't survive.

It was a really interesting thing to write about my own stroke I've learned so much about this when did that go down when did that happen seven you should read the column

it's seven years ago I had it in Hong Kong my brother saved my life he's a doctor the doctor that delivered Gavin Newsom's children who are not delivered was the anesthesiologist

so I had a stroke in Hong Kong and I was ignoring the signs and thought it was just a headache and just a weird thing and my brother said get to a hospital right now you're had a stroke in Hong Kong. And I was ignoring the signs and thought it was just a headache and just a weird thing. And my brother said, get to a hospital right now. You're having a stroke. And I did within the – you have to get there within three or four hours to be able to be okay.

And what are the signs just so we can make this a public service announcement? I did. I wrote them in the thing. But tingling in my hand. I couldn't keep something in my mouth. I had this called dysphagia, which I garbled my words, several words for a while, just for a short time. I had a TIA, which was a mini stroke, it's called. But if I hadn't gotten help, I could have died very easily.

So coming out of that, just quickly, coming out of that near-death experience or something that could have been really bad, any way or approach to life that changed? Well, yes. I became worse than I am now. Yes, I talked about that in the piece. Like one of the things I said, if you want to understand the roots of why I'm so considered so tough, it's like, I don't have time for this. Like you, I don't have time. You and my dad died of a cerebral hemorrhage too. So it all sort of made me think that we have little, little time on this earth and I really don't. Well, we do. And it goes faster and faster.

Yeah. And I, so instead of manifesting itself in niceness for me, it manifested itself in what the fuck? Come on. What are you doing? Life is short. I'm not going to be nice. No, not nice, but I'm nice to my kids and stuff like that. No, but it was more like, you know what?

No. I'm very outspoken, so it's interesting. It was good. It was an interesting issue. I was sad to see Luke Perry die. It was very- That is sad, all right. I spent so. It was an interesting issue. I was sad to see Luke Perry die. It was very... That is sad, all right. I spent so much time

watching 90210. Well, you know what? It's not... Let's give him his props. It's not easy to play a high school student when you're 38. I mean...

No, no. That's real... That's been arranged. He was in his 20s. He was so good. They were all good. I love the kids at West Beverly High.

I could go into it. I'm not going to do this a lot. Let's listen. We got to get to predictions. Okay. Let's get to predictions. All right, Scott. I'm not feeling very predictive, but I predict we're going to have delicious barbecue

in South by Southwest. I can't wait. Maureen Dowd thought the Mueller report would be out soon. That's continuing not to happen, but she had a couple that actually did come true. And then Lauren Good hoped Twitter would get better. I don't think that's like good luck with that

what is that? can you best their predictions? well I don't know mine actually circles back to Maureen Dowd and that is she said something really interesting and that was that she thinks the nation is scarred

from the fact that we went through this financial crisis where people incredible destruction of household wealth and that no one went to jail. And that society still hasn't forgotten that and holds the government responsible. And that is one of the major reasons that people have lost so much faith in the government or believe the game is rigged. So my prediction is around big tech, and it goes further into kind of Facebook Facebook is that I do believe that someone's going to go to jail from big tech. And I believe if you think, okay, if you believe

someone is in fact going to go to jail because we know things will get worse, we know that more bad stuff will come out. And if someone is the fall guy, if it's a company or the fall company, I think most likely it would be Facebook. And this is more of, and it's not a warning, but I genuinely believe this. I think someone's going to go to jail. I think it's most likely someone's going to go to jail from Facebook. And the other thing I'm pretty sure of is it won't be Mark or Cheryl. And so I don't have a lot of friends at Facebook,

but I'm friendly with a lot of people at Facebook. And my advice to them and a lot of my kids who graduated from my class went to work at Facebook, that if you're ever in a room and people are making excuses or glossing over content that is motivating harm to other people, if you're ever in a room where they're talking about or glossing over editorial content that perhaps might be weaponizing elections, I think it's really smart and prudent to have memos to the file and to maybe voice. Yeah, memos like Kelly and Don Manning. 100% and voice your concern because look what happens in these financial institutions.

Whenever there's a billion or $2 billion stolen or lost, it's never the CEO goes down. It's some guy with a bad haircut in Amsterdam who they say, they always call him a rogue trader. So my prediction is someone's going to jail from big tech. It's likely from Facebook and it's not going to be the billionaire and his heat shield Sandberg. So I would say to all the young people working in these companies, if something sounds bad, make sure that you are articulating your concerns. Well, I don't agree with you. I think they're going to get off. I don't think nobody's going to jail. Here's what get off. I don't think Big Tech's going to pay for it. You think nobody's going to jail?

Here's what I think. I think Big Tech is not going to pay for big finance. Big finance didn't have anything happen to it, right? They just walked away with their zillions. I think tech people are going to walk away with their zillions. And I think that there will be. Here's how it – what it is is Ocasio or Warren, these ideas of taxing them. That's where it's going.

And I think a lot of people do agree with the idea that these people make far too much money and don't pay enough taxes on it. I think that's how it's going to come out. And they will start to like get behind a lot of these. If they do it right, and I know that Trump is trying to push back with socialism, socialism, socialism, his gang. I do think that there is a groundswell of these people do not pay their fair share. And if they get the hold of the Trump tax returns and then it shows that, I think it'll be – I think people will be like, wait a minute, just a second here. Well, not only people paying their fair share but companies. Here's a fun fact.

Do you know in Europe, Google has paid more in fines than they've paid in taxes. That's amazing. Isn't that amazing? That's amazing. Yeah, yeah. Here's another fun fact. I'm going off on a tangent here. The median age in Europe is 42.

Do you know what the median age in Africa is? Like 12. It's 18. Isn't that incredible? But anyways, off track. Yeah, the companies need to pay their fair share. There's definitely, I think, a good backfire in the Democrats, this what I'll call class, I do think it's class warfare, saying that rich people are bad and we need to tax them. I think they just need to change it to, well, let's have them just pay their fair

share because right now they're paying less. All right. So we're going to do it in South by Southwest. It's time to get out of here. I will see you in Austin. You will meet my sons. We will have such a good time. We will go for barbecue. When do you get there? I get there, I think I'm there Friday afternoon or Friday evening, and I'm there until Sunday. Good. Well, we have a lot to go on. I will show you around. I know Austin really well.

We'll get on scooters. We will have such a lovely time together. That sounds nice. I'm looking forward to it. All right. Again, we're coming to a live audience, and we will see you there. Rebecca Sinanis produces this show.

Nishat Kerwa is the executive producer. Thanks also to Eric Johnson. Thanks for listening to Pivot from Vox Media. We'll be back next week with more of a breakdown of all things tech and business and it will be extra large because why, Scott, where will we be? Austin. Texas.

All my exes live in Texas in case you're interested. No, they don't. If you like what you All my exes live in Texas, in case you're interested. No, they don't. If you like what you heard, please subscribe on Apple Podcasts or wherever you're listening. 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,

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