Pivot - Meta Joins the A.I. Race, More Twitter Cuts, and Guest Malcolm Harris

Episode Date: February 28, 2023

Dilbert is out of work after his creator made racist remarks. House Republicans are launching an investigation into the toxic train derailment in Ohio. Also, Twitter has cut staff yet again, and prominent Elon-backers are in the mix. Plus, Meta has jumped into the A.I. race at last, sans a chatbot. Kara and Scott are joined by Friend of Pivot Malcolm Harris on his new book, “Palo Alto: A History of California, Capitalism, and the World.” You can fins Malcolm on Twitter at @BigMeanInternet and can find his book here. Send us your questions! Call 855-51-PIVOT or go to nymag.com/pivot. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Support for Pivot comes from Virgin Atlantic. Too many of us are so focused on getting to our destination that we forgot to embrace the journey. Well, when you fly Virgin Atlantic, that memorable trip begins right from the moment you check in. On board, you'll find everything you need to relax, recharge, or carry on working. Buy flat, private suites, fast Wi-Fi, hours of entertainment, delicious dining, and warm, welcoming service that's designed around you. delicious dining and warm, welcoming service that's designed around you. Check out virginatlantic.com for your next trip to London data, and a matching engine that helps you find quality candidates fast. Listeners of this show can get a $75 sponsored job credit to get your jobs more visibility at Indeed.com slash podcast.

Just go to Indeed.com slash podcast right now and say you heard about Indeed on this podcast. Indeed.com slash podcast. Terms and conditions apply. Need to hire? You need Indeed. Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher.

And I'm Scott Galloway. Hi, Scott. How you doing? I feel much better. Thank you for asking. You just like, you literally have been sick 10 of the 12 last weeks. What's... Yeah, I took, I went to one medical. I got medicated. I got a chest x-ray. It turns out I had flu and the pneumonia at the same time. I did not have COVID. And I got the drugs. And within 24 hours, I felt better. I'm still a little congested, but really astonishing service.

And I'm going on Wednesday for a follow-up. It was the easiest thing I've done in a long time, I have to say. All hail Jeff Bezos on this issue, at least. Well, we're glad you're doing better. Yeah. It is really remarkable how easy it is to make healthcare pleasant. I may go get it. I'm thinking about getting a colonoscopy every month.

I find when I get surgery, they're just so attentive to me. They're so nice. Oh, no, do not get a colonoscopy. You taped that, right? Katie Couric wannabe. You're so concerned with me. Yeah, I think your colon's just fine.

Colon of a supermodel. That's what they told me. I have a colon of a 20-year-old who has no fun. That's what they told me. Literally, they're like, you look like a 20-year-old who's never had any fun. I was like, that is about correct. That's about accurate. So there you have it.

We are healthy. So we're going to be here for you. This is what old people do. No, we're very healthy, Scott. We really are in general, except for these ridiculous. Except when the dog's in Mexico. It's the new movie called Cocaine Dog. Cocaine Bear.

I'm so glad your life was adapted into a movie. Cocaine Bear grows $28 million globally over the opening weekend. I could have helped. I should have been a special advisor on that film. They should have had the bear think that helicopters were following him. Yeah. And also a good character would have been the Coca-Cola bear, really jealous that Cocaine Bear got his own movie.

Yeah. I don't even know what this movie's about. I think they had Disney for a week. Yeah. They should replace every character with Cocaine Bear. Like, that's it. You go into any castle, it's just Cocaine Bear. Oh, no.

I watched so much Disney. We went to New York and we didn't stay at your place. We stayed in Brooklyn because I had to interview Audie Cornish. What's going on with that? Well, several things. We stopped and see some friends of mine where I grew up in Princeton. And then we went to New York. I had to interview Audie Cornish.

She won a 2023 Audio Vanguard Award. And so she asked me to interview her. It was an hour interview. We're going to make it into a podcast on Thursday, I think. And it was great. I love Audie, as you know. She's at CNN. She was at NPR. She's a kick-ass lady. And so she asked me, and I did it. And then we went to dinner and then met Louie in Chinatown and went for dim sum. And then Louie and Clara went off on their own and went to candy stores and et cetera. So we had a really, really nice weekend.

We had a lovely weekend with the fams. Okay, so good enough. Let's bring this back to me. Did you see me on CNN this weekend? I was on Smirconish. No, I did not. And Chris Licht finally reached out to me, the head of CNN. He saw the segment and said we should talk.

I think it's because I'm seen as a centrist. Oh, I see. I see. I'm seen as a centrist now. Yeah, or. I see. I'm seen as a centrist now. Yeah. Or maybe you talked about how you didn't get paid or something that, why didn't you call me? And you called, oh, he listens to Pivot, you know. Oh, he does? Yeah.

I didn't know that. Oh, yeah. I didn't know that. Yeah, we text every now and then. But I talked about, I really, I love Michael Smirconish. And he invited me on a year ago to talk about failing young men when it was not politically correct and people got angry. Because of course, if you ever advocate for men, people think you're somehow being anti-women. No, you do that in different ways, but go ahead. Sorry.

That's not fair. I'm teasing you. Oh, my God. Take a joke, cocaine bear. Move along. When I choose between going on CNN and Fox, you know what I choose? What? Blow jobs. Did I just say that? Did I just say that? Okay. Yeah. Okay. Move along. What did you go? So? Blowjobs. Did I just say that? Did I just say that? Okay. Yeah. Okay. Move along. What did you go? So Chris called you. Let's land this plane. Let's land this cocaine plane. I'm now considered a centrist. Oh, you are? Okay. I'm predicting right now a soon to be

failed fifth show somewhere in the universe. Oh, that would be so great. You know what I proposed to Chris Licht? I texted him now and again with some ideas. You always have to one-up me. I say that Chris Licht emailed me and you say, well, and I text him ideas. You always have to one-up me. No, I text him ideas about you, Scott, actually, oddly enough. I think we should have a show. You know how there's The Five on Fox? I think we should have. I have never seen that show. Whatever. It's a good show. It's a good show, even though I hate him. But it's well done. I know why it works. And so I think we should have... I have never seen that show. It's a good show, even though I hate him. But it's well done. I know why it works. And so I think we... I wanted to have a show.

I said, let's do the six or the four. And he's sort of like, like, sort of, they're going to sue us, right, Karen? I'm like, good. This is good. But then Amanda said we should call it the 5.1. Who would the other two be? Who would we have? George Hahn.

George Hahn. Cocaine bear, obviously. We need a conservative. But you need to do what Fox does when they bring on a liberal. They bring on the most repellent person from the other side to basically make their point. Not on the five. They have Jessica Tarloff. I love her. Oh my God. Do you remember the liberal guy they have on Fox? Yes, at Combs. Alan Combs. He's not living. He was with Hannity and Combs, remember? Yeah, but he was distinctly unlikable. And then who did The View bring in? They brought in that quarterback.

Alyssa Farah is there now. She's quite good. No, not her. Before that, Meghan McCain. Yeah, that's right. Who I think is distinctly, I just, you know, dull but dumb. I was going to go. Is that too harsh?

No, I'm with you there. And who was before that? Remember the quarterback's wife that used to just get so angry she'd start screaming? Well, she was just, I don't know. I think Alyssa Farah is very smart. I don't watch The View. I can say that with honesty. Yes, I think we should do this, and we should have outrageous people.

Chris, call us. We're going to save CNN for you and make tons of money in the process, and then we're going to bring cocaine bear you and make tons of money in the process. And then we're going to bring Cocaine Bear on and cause an international incident. And then we're going to get fired spectacularly. What do you think? I thought Cocaine Bear was the sequel to Paddington 2. It's not. It's not.

Let's move on. OK, we'll talk about- Paddington hits a midlife crisis, starts banging his secretary, and gets addicted to cocaine. Now there's a franchise film. Yeah, OK. Just before we move on, I know a lot of young men addicted to cocaine. Now there's a franchise film. Just before we move on, I know a lot of young men listen to this. I talk a lot about drug use, and one of the reasons I work out a lot and try to eat well is so I can enjoy alcohol and THC in moderation. I have never

done cocaine. I will never do cocaine, and I think it is a terrible drug. And I have been around a lot of people who use and abuse cocaine. And what I would say to young people is that... Do not do what the bear does. It's just not a good drug. There are good drugs and there are bad drugs. This falls on the back. I've never even seen cocaine. I told you this story.

People used to think I took cocaine regularly because I was so manic in college. Oh, I've never seen it. I've never seen it. I saw it in Newsweek magazine once. Anyway, today we'll talk about whether it pays to be loyal to Elon Musk. Also, Meta joins the AI race. And we'll speak with author Malcolm Harris about how Silicon Valley helped capitalism take over the world. But first, hundreds of newspapers around the country

have dropped the Dilbert comic strip after creator Scott Adams called Black people, quote, a hate group in a YouTube live stream. Adams was responding to the results of a dubious public opinion poll where 26% of Black respondents disagreed with the statement that it's okay to be white. Adams reacted to the backlash in a subsequent YouTube show saying, quote, most of my income will be gone by next week, and that, quote, my reputation for the rest of my life is destroyed. Scott, you destroyed it yourself. On Monday, Dilbert's distributor cut ties with the cartoonist.

Many editors are defending the decision, saying this is not censorship, it's an editorial decision. Over on social media, by the way, he did have one defender, Elon Musk, came to Adam's defense as newspapers dropped Dilbert. He tweeted the following. For a very long time, the U.S. media was racist against non-white people. Now they're racist against whites and Asians. When another user said, quote, there's an element of truth to Adam's comments, Musk replied, exactly, appears to have deleted those tweets. Oh, Elon, he can't get his little

mitts out of other people's ridiculous controversies. That's my feeling. But let's ignore him for a minute. He's a fucking idiot. But what do you think about this Scott Adams thing? He's a very, he's sort of slowly like festered on Twitter, I've noticed over the years. I used to think he was somewhat smart. Well, first off, I think Scott Adams is a genius. And that's not to say he's not a bigot. It's not to say he's not a bad person. But as someone who, but there's just a uniqueness to his work and an insight.

He's a genius. I think he deserves to be worth a lot of money. And I remember seeing Dilbert when I was in high school or when my first job and just thinking, this guy just has such crisp insight. I wouldn't say he's attacked me on Twitter, but he's come after me a couple times for my comments on Elon Musk. Yeah. And look, I'm on two minds of this. And the definition of intelligence, according to F. Scott Fitzgerald, is to have two kind of contrary thoughts in your mind at the same time. And I'm sort of, look, I ultimately come down on the place that a newspaper gets to make editorial decisions.

That's correct. And we live in an age where your off-camera behavior can impact people's perception of your on-camera work. And he is purposefully pretty, this isn't like one, this isn't like a- No, he's done it for a while. This isn't an off-color comment from Don Lemon. This isn't an accidental, I fucked up and I apologize. You know, he was in favor of Kanye. Yeah, Kanye. fucked up and I apologize. You know, he was in favor of Kanye. Yeah, Kanye. He seemed to go out of his way to not only to not have a, what I'd call a thoughtful discussion around these, around this stuff, like the, you know, talking about the problems of the woke movement or

cancel culture. I get that. I think that should be an important conversation. It seemed like he was constantly trying to provoke it on the side of meanness. And it just all felt like it was verging into always finding reasons for why, you know, the Black Lives Matter movement was wrong. And when he comes out and makes a blanket statement like black people are a hate group. He said white people shouldn't be around them and we should avoid each other. Have you lost it, brother? I know. He's done that a lot. He goes off the deep.

He's done that to me. Exact same thing. Dilbert, very smart. But man, it's not that good, Scott. It's not the other Scott, not you, Scott. Scott Adams. You know what? It's good, but you're not fucking that good.

And by the way, you're a racist. I'm sorry. It's just, there's just, like, I don't use that term lightly, but honestly, you go out of your way. No, you actually, you know what you are? You're an asshole. That's what you are. That's what you, you know, you, he does, he goes out of his way to tweak people, to get, to promote reaction, to make people angry. It's interesting because I, I liked a Mike Moritz column in the New York Times. I haven't seen Mike Moritz in a decade. He's a venture capitalist. He used to be a journalist, very smart venture capitalist. And he wrote a very reasonable thing about San Francisco, and he had a very thoughtful thing. He didn't have enough solutions. And I said,

this is, you should start reading this piece, it's an interesting piece. And he's right about, and I've interviewed London Breed and the DA who all say the same thing that he did. And I got like wanged by all these leftists who were like, how dare you go with an oligarch? I'm like, get off the fucking, get off the lawn, people. I've been beating up on billionaires since you were in short pants. And I know the difference. And I'm going to have a good discussion with someone who cares about the city. And so this guy goes out of his way to be an asshole. And if newspapers want to dump him for saying stupid things, more of it, as far as I'm concerned.

They can put whoever they want in their pages. Yeah, and then the 20% is, but the 80% you're bringing up, and I'll come back to Mike Moritz in a moment, because I hold grudges. 20% of it is, there's a fear, and I think a healthy fear, that someone's off-camera political views begin to contaminate and threaten their livelihood. Yeah. And I don't.

So I initially have what I'd call my spidey sense out. Like, I don't like that. But in this instance, he's a very wealthy man. He's going to be just fine. And he has been, like, poking the bear here for a long, long time. He wants to and he doesn't want to have solutions. He doesn't want to talk thoughtfully about it. He wants to make kind of incendiary comments to inflame the dialogue and make it less productive. He's a bomb thrower of no use to us. Yeah, supporting Kanye. By the way, he's a huge Elon fan. I know. Well, I know. Elon defended him, you saw.

He's one of those people that will throw himself in front of anybody who says anything about Elon. I know. It's kind of sick. So, look. Your brain's been pickled, Scott Adams. I'll tell you, you had a good brain, too bad. The natural arc of his career, and I don't, he's a brilliant, he's a brilliant animator. He's made a shit ton of money. He's had a lot of influence. He's said consistently things that are not productive and even borderline hateful. And I don't like to use that word a lot because, and it's like, if you just take all of these frames of a film, I think you got to take the full 35 frames of a person's life. And if on the whole, they've tried to advance the rights of people,

and they're generally consistent and thoughtful, and they fuck up, okay, you cut them some slack. And one of the things I don't like sometimes is people say, that's it, one strike, you're out. That's not the case here. That's not the case here. But more importantly, back to Mike Moritz, whatever he wrote, he's wrong. He is a small person. I was chairman of a company, and then Mike became chairman, and he was vindictive. If he reflects in any way the culture at Sequoia Capital, I would encourage any entrepreneur to never take that one. Oh, he's a tough one. I know my ex-wife doesn't like him. He's not tough. He's a vindictive man. All right. Okay. He wrote a good piece that I liked. Nonetheless, I was making as a point,

nonetheless, I haven't talked to him in more than a decade, in any case. Cocaine Bear. Cocaine Bear has got to calm the fuck down. If we had a list of people on your list. I have grudges. I treat them like my plants. I nurture them. I water them, and I love them.

I nurture them. I know. I don't. I'm like, whatever. Move along. Let's move on. House Republicans are launching investigations into the toxic train derailment in Ohio. Multiple committees are looking into the disaster and could likely call Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg to testify, which all seems like a good idea.

On Twitter, Buttigieg sparred with Senator Marco Rubio, who has called for the secretary's resignation, proving once again that Marco Rubio is a useless leader. They're making it a dope political thing. Trump went there. It's a terrible disaster. Republicans aren't going to get the bottom of this because they took off safety regulations in the Trump administration. This should be looked at as a nonpartisan thing with the poor people of Ohio. Buttigieg didn't cause this, but he's responsible for it and he has to deal with it. And that's what's most important to me. And so politicizing Marco imagine because their chemistry is so strong and the movie is so amazing. There are a lot of companies, creative expressions. There are a lot of organizations that manage to produce amazing work, even if the players hate each other because they realize their job is to get the job done.

And in Washington, people hate each other so much, they refuse to acknowledge what is our job and do it and put it aside and figure it out. Because I believe every one of them or near every one of them, including both the senators from my state, Florida, Senator Rick Scott and Senator Rubio, they think the only job, their only job, it isn't to make Florida better. It isn't to figure out a way to bring prescription prices down, make the economy stronger, make people less divided. Their only job, their only goal from the moment they wake up to the moment they go to sleep is they think they should be president. And Marco Rubio has been running for president. He will start going to Iowa soon. This is nothing but grandstanding.

He doesn't give a flying fuck about Ohio. I know. That's the thing. It's clear as day. Listen, little Marco, you're not going to be president. You're not going to be president. I'm going to give that. I'm going to give that. I'm going to make that prediction right now. Senator Scott. Look at Senator Scott. Not going to be, another not going to be president. He doesn't get along with Mitch McConnell.

He doesn't even get along with DeSantis. And he just proposed legislation to do away with the entire federal government. It's like, okay, good luck with that. Because all of these, all these individuals do every morning is they don't think what could get passed. How could I work with the other side? It's like what will inflame the other side such that the far right will want me to win the general in Iowa? That is what everything they think about.

Marco Rubio, Senator Rubio had a chance. He was part of the gang for immigration reform. And because he wanted to cater to the far right, he refused to do anything resembling any sort of amnesty. The thing fell apart, and we've had basically 20 years of a non-non-immigration policy. Noodle, noodle, noodle spine people. You know, I think people are just trying to do the right thing here. He's political, too, but honestly, he's trying to fix it. Just help him.

Help the people of Ohio, you dumb fucks. Anyway, so let's get to our first big story. It's been zero days since Twitter went through some drama. The company cut about 10% of its existing staff over the weekend. And I think Elon tweeted, have a nice Sunday to people. That was real nice. Bringing its headcount to below 2,000 staffers. He's really cut this company down from 7,500.

Also out, payments chief Esther Crawford, who oversaw Twitter Blue subscription product. Crawford was an Elon Musk loyalist in an extreme way, who tweeted photos of herself sleeping in the office after the takeover in a sleeping bag. On Monday, Musk announced the company will reward remaining employees with supposedly significant performance-based stock and compensation awards. Let me just say, I want to tell you a funny thing. So that picture of Crawford, which I think, you know, self-abasement knows no lows. She was trying to be like, you know, rah-rah Elon person, hardcore. And I was explaining it to Alex over breakfast this morning. And suddenly Clara goes, sleeping bag? I want my sleeping bag. And so I had to literally get up and go get her sleeping bag.

But that sleeping bag picture was so embarrassing on so many levels. But, you know, whatever she wants to post, it looks stupid. That's fine. She tweeted, of course, the worst take you could have from watching me go all in on Twitter 2.0 is that my optimism or hard work was a mistake. Those who jeer and mock are necessarily on the sidelines, not in the arena. I'm deeply proud for the team

for building through so much chaos and noise. I'm sorry, Esther, this is just nonsense. Well, interestingly, it reminds me a great deal of Yahoo and Uber executives who used to attack me relentlessly. And then when they leave, they'd call me quietly like, oh, you were right the whole time. And they were vile the entire time before. Anyway, what do you think?

The lesson here is when you're fired or you leave a company, you don't make public statements. Or the only public statement you say is, I'm grateful to experience it at, you know, X company and wish them all the best. That's it. Yeah. you know, X company and wish them all the best. That's it. This whole melodrama about how it's a big deal in a soap opera and this somehow reflects, I didn't like it when whatever his name was, James Comey, when he was fired, made it a big deal about America when he was fired. You know what? People get fired. That's okay. That's called capitalism. That was a weird firing. Come on. That was a weird firing.

You're going to be just fine. You're going to find another job. And the loyalty, Trump and Musk are kind of the same person, although Musk has, I think, another 30 or 40 IQ points. Yeah, at least. But essentially, loyalty just goes one way. Yeah. It's like I demand total loyalty, and I will reciprocate it until it no longer makes sense for me. And then you're out. But what I find fascinating here is that I just can't get over how many people he's fired. Yeah.

And the product is still up and running. I wonder when the whole thing's literally going to collapse on itself. I'm feeling collapse-y. Well, he should put out a shitty product. I don't know if it's her fault necessarily, but it didn't work because they were just like trying to rah-rah. She was Twitter blue. Is that right? Yeah. They were trying to rah-rah themselves. Yeah, that didn't work. It was a disaster. Why can't you fault necessarily, but it didn't work because they were just like trying to rah-rah. She was Twitter blue. Is that right? Yeah.

They were trying to rah-rah themselves. Yeah, that didn't work. It was a disaster. Why could you say, oops, it didn't work? That's all I want from her. If she's going to say something, just say, oh, it didn't work. I was fired. I was exited.

You just, it's like the rah-rah bullshit. I find that really repugnant in many ways. You know, the thing is, are these stock awards who's left? This is like, you know, it feels like the glass frigging onion here is, are these stock awards who's left? This is like, you know, it feels like the glass frigging onion here, but are the stock awards valuable to employees that have to IPO, right? Presumably to get, why would you stay for the what? The book? Well, it all comes down to just, to answer that question, you just need to see the terms. If the options are struck at, you know, a of $1 billion, recognizing that the company

is worth less than the debt, if it's RSE, I mean, what are the terms of the stock? If he's writing options at his acquisition price of $45 billion, then the equity is meaningless. I find it's really shocking how many employees don't really understand the semantics of stock options. And what I always say to people who are negotiating a salary, I say, don't ask for more salary, ask for more stock options. And then call me and tell me the vesting, whether it's single trigger, double trigger, the pricing on those options, what they're struck at. Because the majority of people who get really wealthy in corporate America do it one of two ways. They either do it slowly with forced savings through 401k, or they're responsible, and they live below their means. Corporations, the U.S. corporation is still the ultimate vehicle or platform for building wealth. And the other way, the way you kind of get rich quick, if you

will, at an organization, especially in tech, is through options and equity awards yeah but what they do is management screw you they can screw you management perceives that other than the top you know five percent of the executive washroom nobody really understands equity so what they do is they kind of fuck everybody yeah they give you they give you a few options and they make it sound like it's a big deal. No, you should really do the math and say, okay, if the stock doubles and the CEO is going to make another $100 million, am I going to get $11,000 in a free toaster? And the advice I always give to young people is to say, look, I want to be an owner in this company. And I assume you want me to act like an owner, so you should make me an owner. And I want to see if I can get into the next band of options. Because it's an inexpensive way for management to get you emotionally invested in the company. Now, it costs existing shareholders, because there's a dilution there, if you exercise your options. But the way you're going to make any real cabbage at an organization is usually through equity. It's important to understand your options. So, bottom line is, you asked me, are they worth anything? I need to see the terms. Yeah. Yeah, I agree. You know, it's interesting because the blue thing, which we talked about last week, that Meta's probably going to do pretty well and make some money at, had fewer than 200,000

subscribers in the U.S. It's just a failed product, And that's why you fire someone. And what's interesting is stock awards. They really do have to stay. And I wouldn't trust them to pay me. I trust them to renege. Because like, look, Twitter employees lost access to Slack for at least a day last week. Platformer reported the company

hadn't paid its Slack bill. And they don't know if that's the reason for the blackout. They say that someone apparently Twitter manly turned off access. They don't even know. And so, like, I wouldn't even trust him, even if he said he was going to pay me at a number. You don't need to trust him, though. Yeah, he spent a lot of time. I bet the people, like, I bet Vijay Gade hasn't gotten her money. I bet none of those people. I don't even ask them. Well, this is a really important point. So his word now, even legal contracts, he's kind of set a new precedent where he's just said, okay, I sign a five-year lease or a 10-year lease on a building. I'm not going to pay.

You have a contract that says if you get terminated, you get six or 12 months of severance. I'm not going to pay. Take me to court. And it's an abuse. It's not only reflects, in my opinion, poor character when the wealthiest man in the world decides he's not going to pay his rent or there are air charter companies that are now have not been paid for flights he's taken. But individuals who get fired, which is obviously upsetting, now basically get a call saying, or no call from HR because

there's no one there. No, he's decided not to pay. And they're like, well, he has to. And they're like, yeah, but sue him. And his attitude is, a certain number of people just won't sue me or I'll make their life hard. It's kind of the Roy Cohn, Donald Trump. It's the Trump thing, Trump does it, yeah. Again, another. Fuck these people.

I use them. You're fodder, Esther. That's what you are. Just so you know. But when people call me and occasionally say, I'm going to work for a company, can I trust this guy? And I'm like, well, the reason why you have a contract is such that you don't need to trust them. Yeah. And an options agreement is a legal agreement, and it should be legally enforceable.

And it will be. If he awards options and then they're in the money and the company gets sold or goes public, even if he decides he's not going to pay you, it might cost you some money. Those people he owes severance to, they'll get their money. I know, but it's a long and slaggish, it is, I remember when we were leaving News Corp so in very high up, I'll say it was, it was Peter Churton. He said, you're leaving him, he's going to do something bad to you. I said, we're tiny. And that's exactly what happened. And I said, why? He goes, because he can. You know, it was Murdoch. He was talking about Murdoch. And he did well under Murdoch, but it was really, I'm always surprised by this. Just give the people the money and let them go. But he won't. He wants to save every nasty nickel he's got, I guess. I don't know. But I mean, they're down to what,

less than 2,000 people? 2,000, I know. I don't know how to keep it going. You said this. I haven't seen it because, and I want to talk a little bit about Twitter. You said you've seen evidence of diminishing quality and that it's getting buggy. Yeah, I have to click things several times. I think it's bailing wire and bubble gum. That's what's happening here. They can't introduce new things yet, or maybe he'll just rebuild it or bring in a new design. It's not unfixable for sure,

but he's making it increasingly unfixable. He's just probably realized this particular team sucked or it wasn't to his liking. And one or the other, maybe they were good and he just didn't like them and dumped them. That's all. And he's going to keep doing it, folks who are still there, just so you know. And I would say, give me a call, but you know, don't even bother giving me a call. I've had that call. I've been on the end of that call from Uber and Yahoo and all these companies where you had shitty CEOs and you call me and say,

I can't believe you. You are so right. And I'm like, I literally am going to hang up. I can't believe you are so right. They do. They say that. Don't we like me? No, but I'm telling you, I'm telling you, I got strafed by people who then apologized and tried to take me out to lunch.

And I just, you know, what they're doing to platformer, same thing. You know, just they're right. They're very good reporters and they're accurate. And it happened at Uber. I had those people over my back and on my staff's back. And it was just ridiculous. Listen to good reporters, my friends. Ridiculous. I'm defending the fine reporting of Casey and Zoe and all the others. They're doing a great job. Things I've checked, they're doing a great job. I called Casey and I said, Casey, I think you're a super talented young man. Yeah. And I had some ideas for his career. And I said, I would like to leverage the platform or Prop G to kind of elevate your stuff. And he told me what he was thinking. And I'm like, we should come to work for you. I'm like, don't listen to me. Yeah. You should mentor me. I'm like, we should come to work for you. I'm like, don't listen to

me. You should mentor me. I'm like, will you mentor me? Guess who his mentor is, Kara Swisher, just so you know. I know. And he can't get over how right you are all the time. I am right. And this one I am. I get it. We could not be more different. I wake up every morning and I'm like, how many stupid fucking things did I do yesterday? No, no. But here's why. It's because we did an amazing reporting. And so is Casey. And so are Zoe. And fuck you people for strafing them. I'm sorry.

Who's strafing them? I haven't seen them in a while. Oh, my God. All the things. Like, Elon was like, this is inaccurate. This is false. This is, wow, we're going to sue this person. They're such, like, gaslighters.

Anyway, later they will call you for a drink. And don't go, Casey. Or maybe go. Anyway, Zoe, will call you for a drink and don't go, go, don't go, Casey. Well, maybe go. Anyway, Zoe, you're doing an excellent job. All right, Scott, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, Meta pivots to AI and we'll speak with friend of Pivot, Malcolm Harris, about how Palo Alto became the capital of capitalism. 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. These days, online scams look more like crime syndicates than individual con artists. And they're making bank. Last year, scammers made off with more than $10 billion.

It's mind-blowing to see the kind of infrastructure that's been built to facilitate scamming at scale. There are hundreds if not thousands of scam centers all around the world. These are very savvy business people. These are organized criminal rings. And so once we understand the magnitude of this problem, we can protect people better. One challenge that fraud fighters like Ian face is that scam victims sometimes feel too ashamed to discuss what happened to them. But Ian says one of our best defenses is simple. We need to talk to each other. We need to have those awkward conversations around what do you do if you have text messages you don't recognize?

What do you do if you start getting asked to send information that's more sensitive? Even my own father fell victim to a, thank goodness, a smaller dollar scam, but he fell victim and we have these conversations all the time. So we are all at risk and we all need to work together to protect each other. Learn more about how to protect yourself at vox.com slash zelle. And when using digital payment platforms, remember to only send money to people you know and trust. Thumbtack presents the ins and outs of caring for your home. Out. Procrastination, putting it off, kicking the can down the road.

In. Plans and guides that make it easy to get home projects done. Out. Carpet in the bathroom. Like, why? In. Knowing what to do, when to do it, and who to hire. Start caring for your home with confidence. Download Thumbtack today.

Scott, we're back. Meta is jumping into the AI race at last. Mark Zuckerberg announced that the company has trained a new language model and will release it to researchers. The model is called LLAMA, L-L-A-M-A, short for Large Language Model Meta AI. LLAMA. It differs from ChatGPT and Bing, and that is a research tool, not a chatbot. Interesting. I think there's an interesting approach. Meta says that the AI is, quote, part of our ongoing commitment to open science, transparency, and democratize access to new research. This is a

new bark. The tool, however, has not been integrated to any of its products, which is probably a good idea, and he'll let other people play with it. Potential users pointed out that access to Lama, one has to apply and wait to be approved. That's fine. That's fine. Okay. So, what do you think about this? I like the name. Lama. You know Lama Lama Red Pajama. You don't know that. Someone has a two-year-old. Anyways, I like the name. I would bet against it. Facebook or Meta, you know, the number of products they've developed internally. They're great at incremental improvement, which is a form of innovation.

They're good at, but go ahead. They're great at acquisition. I don't know. I don't, as it relates to innovation around new product development, that's just not their strong suit. But they're not doing it. They're doing it as a research show. They're letting it out. And so other people could. I think it's a smart move given what everyone their strong suit. But they're not doing it. They're doing it as a research show. They're letting it out. And so other people can,

I think it's a smart move given what everyone else has done. Here they are. It's probably not ready for prime time for products. Right. Let people play with it. Let people figure it out.

Yeah. And then they can use it and perfect it and point out the problems. And then they don't get slapped with Facebook's, you know, chatbot just called me a whore. You know, they're not going to get one of those from the reporter. I think it's actually kind of smart. I don't necessarily trust them any more

than anybody else. And Monday, Snapchat announced it's adding chat GPT-powered chatbot to its app only to pay subscribers. But this is coming, and this is a way to do it. One wrong move by Mark Zuckerberg, he gets 10 arrows rather than one, right? And Satya gets one or two. And so, I think it's not a... I don't know. I think it's pretty interesting. I think those are good points. I'll sign up. All right. Okay. So, Scott, are you still up? Not a bear, not a cocaine bear. Are you a cocaine bull on Facebook still? I think it's up 40% since we made the recommendation. I think two things are going to drive the stock even higher.

And I don't like this. I don't own the stock. One, they got about $1.2 billion a month they could send right to the bottom line the moment they like wake, the moment, you know, at some point they wake up from this Michael Jackson propanol like sleep they're in. I don't know what the term would be. Anyways. Michael Jackson didn't wake up, but go ahead. Well, actually he woke up every night for 10 years. The reason he didn't wake up is because he was being put under every night for like years.

Yeah, I get it. Because he was being put under every night for like years. Yeah, I get it. Anyways, and then the second thing is, I think they could do, I think they could realize the subscription vision we've been talking about for Twitter at Meta. And with Verified, and just the user base they have, and if they figure out real value add features. And the marketplace values subscription revenue at 2 to 3x what it values transactional revenue at. And if that thing shows any signs of life. So I'm a big bull on Metastock.

And I don't even like saying that. Instagram also? What I have found for Instagram is the power of monopoly. And that is if you're on Instagram, which the majority of the world is, you end up watching a lot of reels. Because it's a much lesser version of TikTok, but it's pretty convenient. You're just sort of there and you start watching it. I think if you look at a valuation, if you look at a price earnings multiple, if you look at its growth, if you look at its moats, if you look at its consumer base,

if you look at its move to subscription and how much money- Stable CEO, stable CEO. And you look at how much money they could save once they exit, again, this consensual hallucination around the metaverse. The stock is just, I would argue, the stock's the best buy in tech right now. So, you know, I'd like to see, you know, I'm not a fan of the company. I'd like to see it broken up, whatever it might be. But as a stock, yeah, it's a great stock. Well, you've done very well. That was a very good prediction.

I was surprised by that. And you've done very well. All right. Let's bring in our friend of Pivot. Malcolm Harris is the author of Palo Alto, A History of California, Capitalism, and the World, about how his hometown played an outsized role in the 20th century's social and political movements and what it means for the 21st century. Welcome, Malcolm Harris.

Of course. Thanks for having me. So we were talking about Palo Alto just a second ago with Facebook, which had started there. I remember all its various headquarters. I visited all of them from University Avenue to various spots around the area. its various headquarters. I visited all of them from University Avenue to various spots around the area. And I've covered a lot of the companies there in and around Palo Alto, most of them. And I'd love you to talk about why, and of course, there's so many, HP, Google, etc., etc., etc.,

in the area, the broad area around there. What does Palo Alto's history specifically unlock about America, Malcolm? Well, it really gives us this nice bookend between the 1870s when capitalism establishes itself as a world system, when the United States as the nation we come to understand it today establishes itself at this time, the post-Civil War era, bookend all the way to now. And this 150, 170-year period is really the same era that we're in to this day, right? It's our current epoch. And framing it that way, back to the 19th century, to the end of the 19th century, allows us to see the progression of not just technologies, but the impersonal social forces that are driving the creation of these technologies. Yeah, but the impersonal social forces that are driving the creation

of these technologies. Yeah, but you have a geographic specificity. What is it about here? Obviously, the proximity to Stanford University, and you write about all kinds of things around Stanford, but what was it about here? And I'm not in Palo Alto right now, but I spent a lot of time there. What is it about the physical geographical place? Because a lot of people talk about that idea of certain areas

that become sort of the center or whatever it's, you know, in ancient Greece or London or whatever. What is it about that? Yeah. So California goes from being in the first half of the 19th century, as far as the Western world is concerned, the furthest corner of the world, right? No one has been able to colonize it very effectively. Even Spanish colonization of Alta California is fairly thin. The Russians are looking. The British are looking. But no one can really figure out how to incorporate Alta California into this world system.

how to incorporate Alta California into this world system. And then in the second half of the 19th century, not only does this far edge of the world get pulled into this world system for the first time, but it becomes the center of this new system. You go from being the last corner of the world to the real middle of this new world at the hinge of the Pacific. And you see this from the beginning that California is exceedingly technologically advanced. So in the early ages of California agriculture, for example, California farms are using three times as many horses as average US farms. And that's because they're technologically advanced, right? Horses are the engines of the farms at that period, and they're dragging agricultural implements. And you see this all the way through. And the radio age is really not that far from this early agriculture.

Yeah, this is what this is. I mean, I think the center of it, they like to say we used to be lemon fields or apricot fields or whatever. That's their little thing they like to do. But really, it's HP that really unlocked everything. Well, HP was definitely an important bridge to the post-war era. Shock, shockly, shockly before that. Yeah, shockly before that.

But even before that is Federal Telegraph, which is really the first Stanford-supported high-tech startup. And they're developing the vacuum tube triode, which is more or less what a semiconducting transistor is, is a triode, which is more or less what a semiconducting transistor is, is a triode. And so the origins of this Silicon Valley go back before silicon, right? They were really great glass blowers before they were making silicon chips. Oh, Malcolm, nice to meet you. Just curious, what other regions, if you had to bet on what the next Palo Alto would be,

have you thought about when you examine the underpinnings of this alchemy that led to just this unprecedented prosperity and innovation, when you look at other regions around the world or in the U.S., do you think that could be the next Palo Alto? The whole history of Silicon Valley is a history of people thinking like, oh, we could remake this innovation district somewhere else, right? And there are a lot of attempts to do that and a lot of failed attempts to do that. And the classic study of this is the one that looks at Route 128 in Massachusetts by Annalise Saxanian. Austin. And this is sort of the dominant perception.

Yeah, Austin's another example. You got Silicon Prairie, Silicon Alley. There is no such thing as Silicon Prairie, but go ahead. I know. They got all sorts of attempts to remake it. And you can go back to when HP tried to start up a new location. I believe it was Colorado and it was a miserable failure. So there have been a lot of these attempts to remake Stanford, remake Palo Alto and other places in the world. And I think the reason it hasn't worked is that Silicon Valley is Silicon Valley to the world, right? Silicon Valley is still Silicon Valley in the Philippines. Silicon Valley is still Silicon Valley in Europe. And that Silicon Valley's relation to the world has always been global. And so you can't just remake it.

always been global. And so you can't just remake it. And I think anyone, if one industry has gotten close, yeah, go for it. Because there have been other tech centers that have emerged. I mean, it used to be the Valley and the Seven Dwarves. And now there is, venture capital has dispersed a little bit. There are other tech centers. Back to what Kara said, doesn't it, if you were going to pick one attribute, I find trouble ever finding a company worth more than 10 billion in tech that isn't a bike ride from a world-class engineering university. Doesn't it, if you were going to pick one attribute, I find trouble ever finding a company worth more than $10 billion in tech that isn't a bike ride from a world-class engineering university. Doesn't it, if you were going to attempt to start to do some sort of Palo Alto, doesn't it all start with a world-class engineering university? Well, then you could look at India, right? So, India, during the Cold War, has a number of world-class engineering universities that both the Soviets and the Americans are competing to invest in technical education in India. But one of the consequences of that is that you see technically skilled Indian workers immigrating to Silicon

Valley, right? It's not that they stay there and build a... And that's because Silicon Valley is still Silicon Valley in India. And so it's this global relation. So if you ask me to pick one place that I see as a deep understanding of Silicon Valley, it's Israel. Exactly. And that's because pay unders – Yeah. No, there was a big story today in the Times about that. And I would agree.

I've been hearing from so many Israeli entrepreneurs. What Netanyahu's doing is killing the tech industry there on some level. But there's a book that's coming out, I think, in a few months, you should have the author on, called The Palestine Laboratory, that's about the Israeli tech industry and how it's created this. Yeah, and how it's created this export, really strong export industry after using the occupied territories as a testing ground for this tech that then exports to other nations. And you see Pegasus is obviously the biggest example,

but it's not the only one. And I think that's a real understanding of what Silicon Valley's role in the world is and what Silicon Valley used to be doing. Because David Packard was, you know, he was testifying in front of Congress saying, let us sell signal systems to Iran, to the Shah, right? Let us sell signal systems to Idi Amin. That's the been a part of it. And it does get, one of the things that's interesting is the caricature of it is a far left bubble. It's just not true. It's just not in my experience, these people are not. I call them libertarian light, which means they're ignorant of libertarianism, but they call themselves that. They do a lot of yoga. They do a lot of yoga. That's not it. That knows no politics. Right, exactly. I think that's true. How do you look at that?

But there are values that shape the area. What would you say they are? In terms of the political values of the area and the politics of the area, I mean, I think people have really short memories. So, like you said, people think of – there are maybe two stories that we tell, and it's the hippies invented the computers, and that was good. And the hippies invented the computer, and that was bad. And this is like a dominant version of Palo Alto history. But the roots are so much deeper than that, that you really can go back to Herbert Hoover and look at Herbert Hoover's politics and the associational logic with which he conducted government, both at the Commerce Department and then in the presidency, and then also in his post-presidency, which I devote more attention to in this book than you typically get. He's at Stanford as a Hoover Institute. Well, and he's not just at Stanford. He's a member of the first class of Stanford University. He's

the prototypical Stanford man. And he takes those values and he brings them all around the world, that he's in Peru, he's in South Africa, he's in Australia, he's in China, he's in Russia. And everywhere he goes, he's bringing Stanford engineers along with him, as well as the Stanford education and the Stanford way of approaching the world, which is at least as much about labor relations as it is about the technology itself. Yeah, very much so. Speaking of hippies, Steve Jobs was indeed a hippie. But there is that side to it. There is that sort of live and let live side to it.

He loved to walk around Palo Alto. He never really left. He stayed very close to where he was born. You know what I mean? The man didn't go far. Well, it's a nice place. And it's funny going through the history, how much of the history is driven by people just saying, like, I want to live there because it's a nice place. And it's funny going through the history, how much of the history is driven by people just saying like, I want to live there because it's nice. Down to like 19th century, early 20th century Mediterranean immigrants in Portugal or Italy land in the East Coast and say, I got to get out of here. Where can you get me that looks a little bit more like home?

looks a little bit more like home up to, you know, in the post-war period, someone like Art Fong, who's an engineer at HP, who grew up in the Bay Area, who says, I don't want to work on the East Coast. I don't want to work in Rochester. I got to get back to California. So that does play a major role. And the maintenance of Palo Alto as this sort of placid suburb has taken work, right? And if you walk around Palo Alto, it does look like these buildings are sort of hiding. And that's because of the particular zoning restrictions that hide industry behind these bushes and create this placid suburb. And the venture capitalists. There's also the venture capitalists are all there too. Oh, a lot of them, certainly. But it's worth looking at pictures of Steve Jobs from the 80s,

as well as the more recent and earlier period. His suits. Not just suits, but it looks exactly like Tucker Carlson. He does. I think Tucker Carlson is trying to look like Steve Jobs in the 80s. Yeah, he had that tie and the... I remember them. And the hair, it's exactly the same. It's really amazing. And when I think of Steve Jobs,

that's who I think of, is this guy in the 80s who's got, you know, Filipino housewives around the Bay Area, you know, wiring boards in their kitchens unventilated while he's, you know, selling Apple as something that he invented. That's the Steve Jobs that I think of. And that has very little to do with the hippie values that we think of. That's a fair point. He did evolve, though, at least, and got a better haircut. Well, and extended the Apple production mode, right? Now you don't have just housewives in the Bay Area. You have the largest production system known to man in some ways.

So, and I hear some similar themes to what Kara says a lot, and that is people leaving Palo Alto and how difficult San Francisco is to live in, that gets a lot of headlines. But the reality is, and tell me, I don't want to put words in your mouth, but my sense is that you're saying that Palo Alto still has this secret sauce, still attracts the best and brightest. And it sounds to me like you're bullish on Palo Alto. Well, one, is that true? And two, if you are, what do you think is the threat?

Like, what could derail? I mean, I said on the last show, Malcolm, when I talk to the kids in my second year MBAs at NYU from all over the world, one in three of them plans to go to the Bay Area. I mean, to think about the human capital pipeline that is just flowing into that area, it's such an unbelievable resource. What do you see, if any, as the biggest threats to Palo Alto in terms of maintaining its presence and importance in the ecosystem?

Well, it keeps trying to destroy the world, right? There's that. Palo Alto is part of the world, and that's something Palo Alto frequently forgets. So if you look at the 19th century and the mining technology, the town where Leland Stanford on the frontier is a barman slash judge, the hydraulic miners are mining under the town to the degree where just after Stanford leaves, the whole town just slides down the mountain because they undermined the foundation of their very existence. And you see the same thing of, you know, what's the signature product of Palo Alto in the 60s? It's not the moon rocket. It's the nuclear missile, which is a cocked gun put to the world's head saying, if anything happens to us, everyone gets it. And now we see environmental destruction

as a direct consequence of the mode of production that Palo Alto has foisted upon the world. And they can't deal with that, right? If you look at what is their solution, their solution is find another Earth somewhere, right? It's go to Mars. Yeah. And that's not going to happen. They're hitting really hard planetary limits. Yeah, they don't like consequences.

So I'm not bullish on Palo Alto. I'm definitely not bullish. They're not good with the consequences, those people. They don't really care because it's so pretty there and they can get a good coffee. That's really... When I think about it, like Oscar Wilde, the portrait of Dorian Gray, right? Where it's got the portrait aging in the attic. And tech is sort of like Dorian Gray looking at this portrait saying, everything in my

life is so great, except for this darn portrait. Like if I just got to fix this portrait, then everything will be great. That's a really good. And they don't understand that it's the other side of the same coin. It's the consequence of their own prosperity. So what is the solution, though? I'm going to press you for a solution because there is still, you know, look, Musk just moved back his engineering headquarters, which is really the heart of the situation to Palo

Alto from Texas because nobody wants to live in Texas in the summer or much of the year. And the abortion thing seems to bother many women and men too. What has changed? Because I do perceive a difference of younger startups in mentality and consequence. And it's not just lip service, it's actual thoughtfulness around it. Do you pick that up or not? I think there's a lot of thoughtfulness coming from tech workers about their place in the world and their place in the industry and their industry's place in the world. And impact. What the consequences of that would be. Yeah, absolutely.

And I think that's a throwback to the 60s and where you had tech workers doing very close research about the role they were playing in the world and in the war in South Asia in particular. So I see echoes of that in the tech worker organizing that we see now, but it's a really uphill battle. And tech is pretty committed to showing that it has control of its labor costs, which I think is what we saw in this last round of layoffs. If you had the ear of the city council, I don't know the politics of Palo Alto, what advice would you have for them? Well, the way I end the book is I talk about Stanford in particular having an opportunity to return land, land that it has acknowledged is the ancestral land of the Moek Moloni, who are a politically constituted tribe in Palo Alto and South Bay that Stanford

acknowledges as the rightful inheritors of this land. And they have an opportunity to really change their role in the world by returning some of this land, creating a land base for this tribe that had been dispossessed at the beginning of this not very long history. And I think that's a really low-hanging fruit, right? Stanford's big. They got 8,000 acres that they've managed to maintain since this colonial period.

Farm. I love when they call it the farm. I want to slap them. Well, yeah, farm for what, right? So to what end though, Malcolm? What would be the 10 years on after they do that? What, other than trying to right a historical wrong, to what end?

Well, I think it's about leadership. And I think the only way we're going to solve the sort of problems that we're talking about is the cessation of lands to people who are prepared to tend them responsibly. And Palo Alto and the tech industry is really not. And they've shown themselves to be irresponsible over this entire period. And now they're hitting on this planetary limit. And so the question is, are we going to continue giving our resources

as a society to these tech entrepreneur leaders? Are we going to ask them to colonize another planet for us and to maintain our species that way? Some people believe that. Usually we wrap up with, we like to kind of land the plane on a positive note, but just to push back a little bit, the culture we're talking about here, granted, it has huge externalities and we talk about this, but they've created tremendous innovation and economic

prosperity and, you know, research that's resulted in a lot of very positive things for the world. Don't you think there's a balance here? It feels, I mean, we're the first to criticize big tech, but if you could press a button as the U.S. and not have Palo Alto or to hold onto it, wouldn't you choose to hold onto it? Hasn't it been a net good? And I hate the word net

because it doesn't absolve us from trying to address these externalities, but hasn't Palo Alto been a net positive for the U.S. and the world? Definitely for the U.S. and definitely not for the world, I don't think. Because that threat to destroy the world that is Palo Alto, right? The Palo Alto is this threat to the world that if anything happens to the American project, the whole world gets it, has been incredibly destructive and has allowed the inequalities that structured the world 100 years ago to persist into the present day in a way that 100 years ago they did not think was possible.

Even a capitalist like Keynes, for example, everyone assumed by 2020s, you know, we would have a world of equality. And instead, we've maintained a world of inequality that hurdles ever closer to, again, these like real hard planetary limits. And so if you ask someone in 2050, you know, was Palo Alto good for the world? Was the tech industry good for the world? We got to be able to imagine that far ahead, even when Palo Alto asks us not to. That is an excellent point, Malcolm. Well said. It's great to have very different opinions about these things. And Scott beats

up on oligarchs and the love of billionaires quite a bit, just so you know. Palo Alto, A History of California Capitalism and the World is available now. Thank you, Malcolm Harris. Congrats on the book, Malcolm. It was nice to meet you. Thank you so much for having me. Scott, that was excellent. You did a great job, I have to say. Go on. You did. Would Poppy be impressed? If you knew her, yes, she would. Did you hang out with Poppy this weekend? Yes, I did. We had lunch. Our children had lunch. Did you guys talk about it? Does she want to know? She wants to be my friend, right? No. No? Well, no, we didn't really talk about you at all. We talked about the kids and her work and stuff like that.

That's what we talked about. But we will talk about it. I did write her that we discussed her on the show, and now she wants to meet you. How's that? Oh, nice. Yeah. We've met before. She's interviewed me on Amazon.

I mean lunch. I mean lunch. I mean like real meeting, people meeting, possible friendship. It's not all about me. Okay, it's about me. You would really like her. You know what who's great? Her husband is amazing. Amazing guy. Yeah, you'd like him. You and he would get along like peas and carrots. He's really terrific. And she has lovely children, I have to say. They're enthusiastic and interesting.

Yeah, it doesn't surprise me. None of that surprises me. They showed me all their taekwondo moves. Her husband's like a champion taekwondo person. Really? Yeah. They're a nice family, but the kids could kick very high. I was a little frightened at some point. So they got that going for them. Yeah, I like that.

Yeah, Clara just was like, what the hell's happening here? Did your kids do karate when they were younger? Alex did, and it was okay. And then they did a summer thing where they went for a camp, a summer camp. Yeah. You know, I don't think Louie liked it much. And Alex was pretty good at it. I think it's great. I went.

I was so impressed with the values and discipline and never strike first. I just thought it was really great. Yeah, it's big in San Francisco, so it was easy. Do you know I have a judo, a green belt in judo? Do you really? I do. You're a complex person, Kara Swisher easy. Do you know I have a judo, a green belt in judo? Do you really? I do. You're a complex person, Kara Swisher. I didn't know that.

I'm going to flip you sometime. I'm good at the defensive flipping. Anytime. Yeah. I use your weight and your strength for my benefit. Yeah. That's why I like it. But then one time someone sat on me, and that was the end of it.

That was it? You were done? Yeah. A lady. I got down to 105 pounds. I can't believe I was that skinny. Yeah, but at 4'1". No, it was skinny.

I was skinny. But let me just say, someone sat on my head and my face with their butt, and I said, that's enough of that. I didn't go for the next belt, the brown belt. Unless you're paying for that. That's not enjoyable. And then I got a little culty.

I'll be honest with you. I got a little too culty for Kara Swisher. Yeah. Scott, one more quick break. I really appreciate your questions there. We'll be back for wins and fails. As a Fizz member, you can look forward to free data, big savings on plans,

and having your unused data roll over to the following month. Every month. At Fizz, you always get more for your money. Terms and conditions for our different programs and to the following month. Every month. At Fizz, you always get more for your money. Terms and conditions for our different programs and policies apply. Details at Fizz.ca. Okay, Scott, let's hear some wins and fails. I'm going to go first.

Great. We gave a young reporter named Hannah Dreyer a big award. I do the Livingston Awards many years ago for her stellar reporting. And she put in a report from the New York Times this week on migrant children as young as 13 working in the supply chains at major corporations. I got to tell you, I think she's the finest reporter around. Here's why. Because she did great reporting. There was no judgment. She didn't overwrite it.

She just, she was a camera to it. Something that's not new, by the way. My grandmother used to spool thread with her hand. She used to say her hand hurt from when she was a kid doing child labor in a sewing factory, right? So, this is not a new new fresh thing for immigrants. My grandmother was an immigrant. But it was devastating. And she did it in this way of telling the story of these people and what happens. And the HHS really needs to have some things to answer for in terms of speeding up, moving these kids through the system. And then they end up trying

to go to school and then working 12 hours, putting Cheerios in a box at a factory or whatever it happens to be, construction. Far too young. They come here unsupported because they managed to get in, but their parents don't. And then they get these sponsors and the whole sponsorship program is fucked. And even if they go with people who are relatives, the relatives don't know them and they're already under a lot of financial pressure. And so these kids have to, and of course they have worked too their whole lives to keep their head above the water. It was, Ana Dreyer did such a good job and she didn't cast blame. She just said, here's how it was happening. And it was, you know, she didn't have to cast blame. We saw it was so beautifully wrought and so fair and so sad that I just was, I was, I thought about it all weekend. And, you know,

again, not new, but the consequences of our decisions our politicians make. And you have these Marco Rubios, et cetera, mouthing off on Twitter. And this comes in and you're like, this is what we need to fix. This has been going on for decades, these child labor issues. And it goes way back to Jacob Rees and all across the world. It's not a new, fresh thing. But man, it shouldn't be happening, at least in this country, for sure. I love that, Karen. I'm glad you brought it up. That article rattled me

as much as anything I've read. And you read it, and you keep saying, wait, this is happening in America? Yeah. A 14-year-old who falls asleep in class because she has to leave after class. She goes to work for nine hours in a factory sewing. You know, okay, you just get so angry, like, someone needs to go to jail. Yeah. I would say Xavier Beccara, really. I was just beyond belief angry at failing on his job. And how do we get, you know, I think, like, do we get nonprofits or churches? How do we? Didn't she do a good job, though? It was just. Wonderful.

She didn't. It could have gone a different way. And it was reporting. The story wasn't about her. There wasn't adjectives and embellishments. It wasn't. You didn't need it. It wasn't lifetime and soap opera. It was just great reporting. It was a camera to what's happening, and she's really talented. I've signed her to be one of the finest reporters in our country. And she's young, very young. Anyway, you should read it. Do yourself a favor. And it also, again, we're not stupid. This is nothing new. There are abuses happening all over the place. We understand that. But this one should not be happening, and it. And there are things in place to fix it. And it is not occurring because of these ridiculous partisan fights we're having about

immigration. These are hardworking people. And there's nothing wrong with hard work. But I wrote my thesis at Columbia when I was at journalism school about kids in SRO hotels, because their families were... These people live in SRO stuff too. What happened, I was at journalism school about kids in SRO hotels because their families were, these people live in SRO stuff too. What happened, I was doing like a stupid story at a school and this kid fell asleep at the desk. And I was like, what's happening there? Just noticed it, you know, and said, well, she has to take the bus from down in Herald Square to come up to 96th Street. And I said, why is she in a school there? Well, she's in an SRO hotel. So she's got to get up an hour and a half earlier to get up here on a bus, la la la. And so I rode the bus back with her. And family lived in an SRO hotel that New York

City had made permanent. It was supposed to be a temporary solution for family housing. And I had a photographer, same thing, that these kids were just subject to so much extra work in order to get an education. And she didn't even have to have a second job at this point. But I just, I don't know, it just stuck with me in a way that very few stories do anymore. Congratulations, Hannah. I mean, in a good way, in a bad way, I guess. way and a bad way, I guess. So that was a fail and a win, I guess. I don't know if I have a win. Do I have a win? Louis Swisher, once again, best brother. That's what I was saying. Yeah. He was great with the kids and carried them all over Chinatown on his back. And they had a great time. And I would hire him as a babysitter in 14 seconds. He's so good. I think you have. You're just not paying him. I have, but I don't.

Speaking of child labor. Yeah, right. He's almost 21, Scott. I'm good with it. And he knows how lucky he is, too, by the way. He knows his privilege. He really does in a good way, but he works really hard, too. Anyway, I felt very grateful for my children after reading this, especially.

I felt so sad for all these kids. Go ahead, Scott. So, my fail is there is proposed legislation from Netanyahu in Israel that would effectively replace their judiciary. Tictator. Their judiciary. It's sort of the way to imagine it is imagine if the evangelical wing of the Republican Party figured out a way to replace the Supreme Court. And it really is frightening. And I am an investor in and on the board of several companies started by Israelis, specifically people who serve in the Israeli army. by Israelis, specifically people who served in the Israeli army.

And I've always been just so drawn to these individuals because I find they have such a— Sure. Noam at Bost, right? Well, Noam, Nadav Shavala at OpenWeb. I mean, these are just such impressive— They are. Young people who feel—you know, they see themselves as— and one of the reasons I'm a big advocate of national service is they typically see themselves as Israelis first before they see themselves as conservatives or liberals. And they oftentimes meet their partner, their co-founders in the army. They oftentimes meet

their spouse in the army. And Dadaav just got married and has a beautiful little girl. He met his wife in the Israeli army. Anyways, I'm just an enormous fan of Israeli culture. And just for what Malcolm was saying, it's paid off enormously for the tech community. And the tech community is, pretty significant players are uprooting and leaving because Netanyahu has decided

to give in to this extremist right faction that wants to do away- He is an extremist right faction that wants to do away— He is an extremist right faction. So it is severely undermining Israel's claim to be a democratic— I agree. A democratic society. And when you think about Israel, it's such a fantastic ally. It's such a beacon of prosperity.

And the tech community, distinctive of the morality of all this, the tech community is seriously, for the first time, I know so many Israelis who Israel's their home no matter what, they're always pro-Israel. And for the first time, I hear them, first time saying, I may be done with Israel. And to hear these words come out of their mouths, it's so shocking. And to know what's going on over there and what the equivalent would be here. So, I think it's a dangerous moment for Israel. And typically, when countries go very religious, they become very warlike. And that is not where we want Israel right now. And also, the people advocating for these changes tend to be people who get a disproportionate amount of government subsidies because they either don't work or they want to occupy the West Bank. I mean, Israel's headed down, in my opinion, what, for his own dirty-handed business that he's over the many years.

This guy is a dangerous politician, has always been from the get-go, from the get-go. a beacon for democracy and one of our most steadfast allies and an incredible epicenter of prosperity, losing or potentially not appreciating democratic institutions. My win is there was some research this weekend or last week showing that working mothers are actually spending as much time with their kids now as non-working mothers used to. Basically, we're spending more and more time with our kids now is non-working mothers used to. Basically, we're spending more and more time with our kids, but that's not what my win is about. Research that got less press was there was some research done on mothers who, quote-unquote, coddle their infants and toddlers. And that is constantly looking after them, touching them, reinforcing them, playing with them, coddling them.

And so there was some notion that, okay, is that good or bad? And there's research that shows that when the kid becomes a teen, when you clear out every obstacle, that can have negative consequences because they develop sort of this princess and peace syndrome where they get to college and they're so used to people clearing out every obstacle. They've had so many sanitary wipes used on their lives. They have none of their own immunities. They get their heart broken. They get their first C and they freak out. There's some legitimate truth to the coddling teenagers can have negative externalities. However, however, this research on coddling infants and toddlers, when they finally got to the age where they could register the outcomes of these kids, what they found is, is that the kids who were in the quote-unquote coddled group, mothers all over them, loving them, less prone to depression,

more likely to engage in productive relationships. And I just love the summary of this research. Yeah. And the summary is the following. It's impossible to love your children too much. Mm-hmm. And I just thought it was so lovely. Yeah. And it's just such nice reinforcement that every instinct you have to, you know—

Let them fall down. Yeah. think you have to, you know... Let them fall down. And, yeah. To love, you know, babies and your toddlers and to coddle them and spoil them and be attentive to them, that there isn't a downside. That there isn't a need to take their blanket and burn it and have little boys man up. There isn't a need for that. I would agree. I do think there's a need for letting them do their own things. Like today, Claire's like, I'll do it. And you have to let

them. Sure. That's coddling. Yes, it is coddling. That's loving. But I tried to put on her shoes, and she's like, no, I'll do it. And I'm like, I have to let her do it. I wanted to do it, of course, because I'm faster. But one of the things that's, I would agree with that. I think of the many people I cover over the years, the one thing I always think of, of the really bad ones, I thought, I always want to ask them, I always want to say to them, I'm sorry your parents didn't hug you to them enough, but that's, you got to stop, right? It's not going to happen. You're not going to get it back. get it back. Every one of them has been, has lacked love. I just don't, I don't, I don't, I can't, there's no, there's no expert to it, but it is a very close, you know, not everybody has the, my dad died when I was five, but I remember him loving me, you know what I mean? Like coddling me. And so it's a really important thing to do that. There's no amount. You're 100% right.

And it's, you know, Amanda's very demonstrative to the kids, more so than I am. I'm actually, we hugged a lot this weekend, actually. I was thinking about that. And it was good for me, too. You know what I mean? It's not just good for the kids. It's good for the parents. We're supposed to lie on top of each other. Yeah, exactly.

Well, that's what happened. We're supposed to touch each other of each other. Yeah, exactly. That's what happened. We're supposed to touch each other. I was coughing like a mother. But one of the things that's important about that, it'll be interesting to see when they study the COVID situation and people being in the pandemic. I believe my two younger kids are going to be happier than ever because we were all around for them. Because we were stuck in the house, including the boys. Because we were all around for them because we were stuck in the house, including the boys. Their relationship between my two older sons and the two younger ones is beautiful. It's just beautiful. And we spent a lot of time with them. So it'll be interesting. And you spent a lot more time with your kids, right? It'll be interesting to see the, I'd love someone to study that, like pandemic kids or something. Anyway, negatives about school, et cetera, et cetera, the externalities. But that's an interesting, to me, will be an interesting study too at some point. Did your boys, I see my boys can't stand each other. They genuinely don't

like each other. For five minutes. No, they do. Oh my God, they go at it. They go at it. I'll text them when I'm on the road. I try and text them a lot, and it just digresses. Well, how old are they? 12 and 15. Yeah, exactly. Louis was like, stop following me, Alex. Stop hanging with my friends. That is so typical.

Now, I could throw them through the window easily without a problem. But yeah, that's normal. That's normal. They get along pretty good. They're being very normal. You know what I used to do? I'll tell you. Can I give you a piece of parenting advice?

Oh, what? I used to find an activity that they just did together, whether it was going to do ceramics or, but something that's a thing, like they had to do together that was fun. And I would just drop them off and say, good luck, get home. I used to do, I purposely make them hang out together away from parents doing something versus just hanging out. And I thought that it worked really well. Yeah. I drop my boys off at a ceramics class and I get a call from someone saying that one's been shivved in the neck with a piece of broken glass. I'm just telling you, let them develop their own relationship and stay out of it. That's what I would say.

Today's show was produced by Larry Neiman. No, no, no, no. We want to hear from you. Send us your questions about business tech or whatever's on your mind. Go to nymag.com slash pivot to submit a question for the show or call 855-51-PIVOT. Scott and I will be at a ceramics class now. That's what's happening. And we're going to paint something lovely for Easter, perhaps.

I don't know, Scott. Let's think creatively. All right, Scott. that's the show. We'll be back on Friday for more. Now read us out. Today's show was produced by Lara Naiman, Evan Engel, and Taylor Griffin. Ernie Andertot, engineer in this episode. Thanks also to Drew Burrows and Mule Silverio.

Make sure you subscribe to the show or every listen to podcasts. Thanks for listening to Pivot from New York Magazine and Vox Media. We'll be back later this week for another breakdown of all things tech and business. You cannot love your children too much. Nor can you hug your cocaine bear enough. Cocaine bear.