Pivot - Supreme Court Saves Social Media, Montana Bans TikTok, and Sam Altman Wants AI Regulation

Episode Date: May 19, 2023

EU regulators say 'game on' for the Microsoft-Activision deal, WeWork's CEO is stepping down, and the latest call for AI regulation is coming from inside the house. Kara and Scott discuss the weak plan to ban TikTok in Montana. And Elon Musk continues to Elon Musk, saying he’s willing to lose money to say what he wants to say. Also, a prediction about the writer's strike. Listen to On with Kara Swisher's episode, "Will Elon Musk Turn Twitter Into Yahoo Mail?" 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

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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. And I am Christiane Amanpour.

Actually, we all are. She gave a great speech, Scott. But hello, how you doing? Okay, say more. She gave an amazing commencement address at the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism, where I went. And she works for CNN. She's a very well-known CNN person. And she actually went against CNN. And she said she had spoken to Chris Licht and then gave a stemwinder of a speech where she said a lot of stuff, a lot of really interesting stuff, which I obviously agree with. It was elegant and also eviscerating at the same time. One of the things she said that really struck me is be truthful, but not neutral. Both sides-ism does not get you to the truth.

Drawing false and moral factual or factual equivalence is neither objective or truthful. And she sort of schooled CNN on some stuff. You know, she's just the kind of person they say they want, who's super, you know, delivers the news. And you don't ever think of her as a pundit in any way. And she sort of handed them their heads. It was quite something to see. They knew she was going to do it. She told them.

I don't think they have much control over her or she wouldn't really listen to them. So anyway, it was an interesting speech and I applaud her for it. Thank you. My most viral video clip of 2023 is when I was on with Christiana. I like her.

She's an impressive woman. Well, just as it's great to live in America where you can shitpost America nonstop, but if someone asks you about Turkey or China, you become very thoughtful and measured because you're a total prostitute for money and you're a truth teller in democratic free speech environments. And then you become, I'm of course talking about Musk. It's great to work for CNN where they say to the reporters, we respect your rights to say what you want to say off camera versus working at Fox. Well, not everybody. I didn't like Oliver Darcy's newsletter. What, because he went on

background with you and bitched about a bad meeting? No, he did not. He did not. I didn't write one story about it. By the way, I haven't had breakfast. I'm hangry. I see that. I didn't write one story on this company. But nonetheless, I'm sure they're not happy that she did this one. She has a higher status. Like I can say things that maybe others at Vox can't say. Oh, and also, I'm getting calls from my lesbian friends saying, you really don't know how lesbians have children from our last episode. I know. Many people were surprised by that. from my lesbian friends saying, you really don't know how lesbians have children from our last episode.

I know. Many people were surprised by that. And by the way, I just want to point out, I absolutely don't understand how it happens. This is how it happens. Oh, Scott. We're moving on to lesbianism. I'm going to finish with Christiana Monopore.

She's a real hero. I thought she elegantly did it. These are people she works for. She obviously has greater status, so can say than than other people at the company who are not allowed there's a real i know you don't think it's a big deal but there is a real groundswell of upset within that company and i think she articulated with a lot of class you know what i mean like and i think that's a great thing i think all news organizations have to get used to being covered themselves including being talked about by the people who work there. And there's this old school idea

that you're not supposed to talk about the place you work. And I think that's bullshit because, you know, you have to, it's a media organization. It's not, you're not working for Exxon or whoever. And so I think that she, as usual, met my already high expectations, doing a classy dissent.

And in a really great way, I know inside of CNN, it's much appreciated because she has a lot of status and can do these things while others get slapped down. In any case, well done, Christiane. And Scott, if you have any questions about lesbian procreation, why don't you proceed? So they literally called and said, you really don't understand how lesbians have children. I'm like, of course I do. You guys cry and hug for several hours as Riverdale plays in the background and a German shepherd pulls up in a Subaru and delivers a baby. Oh my God. How can I be so wrong yet so

right? Oh God. I'm not even going to tell you. I don't even imagine. Oh, good God. We go to the doctor's office. We go to the doctor's office and get inseminated. That is how it happens. As you know, I've told this story before. I happened to be on the phone with Walt Mossberg while I was undergoing the procedure. Yeah, I was. That's what happens when you get to my age and Walt's age. A lot of procedures.

Let me just say, if that ever happened, I would not be talking to you during such a procedure. Walt, I trust you wouldn't be making rude jokes throughout any kind of insemination procedure. Thank you. So, there you go. So, just so you know, I do make jokes during insemination procedures. It doesn't work. Just so you know. If I don't bring some humor to me during that situation, it's a disturbing experience.

Why did I even start? I'm trying to start this morning on an elegant way with Christiane Amanpour. That's hilarious. And you take it right down to lesbian procreate. All right, whatever. We're going to move on. We're going to move on. You're in Miami, right?

You and your virtue signaling around how much you like Christiane Amanpour. It's not virtue signaling. Who doesn't love Christiane Amanpour? Why don't you just not be a cynic about someone who's doing something great? Just say, God, that was cool. She's doing great work. Anyway, we have a lot to talk about. The CEO of OpenA says he wants Congress to regulate artificial intelligence. We'll get into that. I know you had a little tweet situation on the whole thing. Also, the U.S. state bans TikTok outright. Shocker, it's a GOP state. And we'll unpack some of Elon Musk's latest failings. But first, the Supreme Court has punted on its Section 230 decision, like we said, Scott, in the case of

Gonzalez versus Google, the one about the family whose daughter was killed by ISIS in Paris. The court sent a decision back down to the lower court, punting. Another related case, Twitter versus Tamna. The court ruled unanimously that Twitter did not provide assistance to ISIS. In that case, the family lost someone in an ISIS attack in Istanbul. The rulings are being called a win for social media companies because they are, we predicted they would not touch this thing. The courts are not going to be social media regulating, nor should they in this case. And Congress, of course, does nothing. So where does that leave things, Scott? It leaves them where they are. And it's really interesting. Well, I don't know. Can

you think of another body right now that has lost more credibility this quickly than the Supreme Court? No, no. In this case, I think they made the right decision. I agree. I agree. No, it's I think, like I said, it's really a shame. I know we should just give Clarence Thomas a million dollars to stop being so corrupt. Just get in here. Just you need the money. Well, actually, it's an interesting point. And that is, should we be paying? And I think there's I think this is worth exploring. I wonder if we should be paying our elected officials a lot more money. And because I think a lot of them. Yeah, they are prone to.

But then they need to raise money. Maybe the Supreme Court or regulators. Well, the Supreme Court also. But I do think a lot of these, a lot of elected officials have their eye on the paid positions and jobs. The next prize, yeah. And I think it's unhealthy. I think it ends up perverting their decision-making. And there's something to be said for – I mean, we had Senator Warner on.

Senator Warner can't be bought. Yeah. He's, you know, and I'm not suggesting we only have rich people in Congress, but there's something about maybe paying these people more that I think warrants consideration. Well, in any case, any thoughts on these? I think this was not the appropriate place for these decisions, and they were not correct. You cannot hold them accountable. This is not how, you know what, change Section 230 if you don't believe, like, legislate, rewrite it. 230 is the law. They interpreted 230 correctly into, I just don't know what, I can't imagine the precedence it would set in the number of

cases that we filed the next day if a tourist in Paris, which is a tragedy, who was killed by ISIS, is somehow they find Twitter liable for that. So. Yeah, that was Google. That was Google. Oh, it was Google, excuse me. But that to me just, okay, now what, right? Yeah. So, yeah, I agree with you. I think they got this right. I don't mind that they brought it and tested it, but it just seems like this is not what the law says. Again, change the law. The problem is not the Supreme Court here, although the Supreme Court has become a massive problem, I think, in terms of their ethics and standards. But this is Congress's job. This is Congress's job. This is Congress's job, as with most things. And they can either do it around this or AI or anything else, or they could not and then reap the whirlwind,

which they have reaped. Anyway, there's a new group leading negotiations over the debt ceiling, and it's inspiring confidence across parties that the deal might happen. The White House has called on its counselor, Steve Reschetti, Budget Chief Shalanda Young, and Legislative Affairs Chief Louisa Terrell. Republicans are sending Representative Garrett Graves to negotiate. He has a pretty good reputation. Reschetti and Terrell are said to have the full competence of President Biden. I assume Young does also. Oddly enough, I was at a dinner where I sat next to Steve Reschetti, and he's the most avuncular,

sort of Midwestern-y, friendly guy I've met in Washington to date. He was such a lovely fella. So I suspect he was being that way. He's like that all the time. So I had a little more confidence when I heard his name. But I think he seems to cross aisles quite a bit and is very well-liked by the Republicans. I can't imagine he wouldn't be. In any case, will we get a deal before default day of June 1st, according to Janet Yellen? I think so. I think this is a loser. This is mutually assured destruction for both parties. Biden would look terrible. It'd be terrible for the country. The Republicans would come out of this. Look, it's just, there's just, the incentives are aligned here to figure this shit out. And that's what they're going to do.

Yeah. I mean, there's some worry on the left that they're going to do these work requirements, but Biden said it's no big deal around payments. So there's that. And there's certainly worry that McCarthy will get more than he deserves for throwing a tantrum. Nobody loves giving into a tantrum, obviously. Yeah, what I've seen is, I mean, I'm curious to get your thoughts here, but what I've seen is basically Speaker McCarthy has said, wink, wink, just give me something symbolic that has no meaning that I can throw at the crazies and say we got something. Yeah.

Because- I wonder if they say that when the door closes, like, oh, good fucking heavens. Like, anyway, sorry. We can throw at the crazies and say we got something. Yeah. Because. I wonder if they say that when the door closes. Like, oh, good fucking heavens. Like, anyway. Sorry. Go ahead. Well, you know what? I forget who it was. I don't know if it was Senator Bennett said something I thought that was really insightful.

And it made sense. And that is once the cameras go off, these people are surprisingly reasonable. And that is we live in a society where the algorithms reward craziness, and that raises donor money from the crazies. And so, people want to, once the cameras are on, they make these very bold, principled, angry statements, and then they go behind closed doors, and they're more reasonable. And what Senator Warner also said, which I thought was interesting, is that if you look at the last couple years, it's actually been a fairly productive Congress. That is true.

Especially the Senate. Especially the Senate. Yeah. Yeah, that's true. I think the fact that they're doing it in front of the camera is like, does everything have to be this performative bullshit? Like, they're obviously going to get to an agreement. Said to people with three podcasts. Yeah, but we're paid to be a performative bullshit, let me just say. These people,

no, they're not. They're paid to do the budget. No, they're paid to do the fucking budget. And it drives me crazy. Anyway, likely, they will get to that. Wall Street will be happy, stocks will go up, et cetera. Another story, interesting, since I know you know this guy pretty well, I don't know, I know him just vaguely, WeWork CEO Sandeep Mantrani will step down. He became CEO in 2020, led the company to going public in 2021. WeWork has since struggled to turn a profit and earlier this year struck deals to cut debt by $1.5 billion. Current WeWork board member David Talley will take his place as interim CEO. Shares of the company have tumbled at the news, leaving them down 96% for the year. Obviously, they're suffering from nobody's going to work or, you know, the startups aren't starting up as much, et cetera, et cetera.

So what do you think? You were sort of positive on this guy. I know you, you know, you sort of smacked at WeWork for years, but you had good thoughts about him. Sandeep is one of those sort of elder statesmen of the real estate business. He ran, I think it was General Growth Properties, very, very well liked. I wouldn't call us friends, but I've done some work with him. Very smart, very well respected. My guess is he got an enormous pay package to come try and be a shepherd or a steward of WeWork, I would say that this is probably the beginning of the end of this chapter of WeWork. It strikes me as a similar situation.

I haven't spoken to him or anyone else at WeWork, but it strikes me as being similar to when that very well-respected CEO of Vice left. This means the company is likely going to file chapter. It just doesn't. I read the numbers. It did $800 million in revenue, and it lost $300 million. And this isn't a growth company with IP that can justify those types of losses. It means that the business just doesn't work. Yeah, it never did, did it? They spent too much money.

They entered into a series of long-term leases that basically made it impossible for them to ever make money. No one's willing to look at this thing. The markets aren't willing to look at this thing as a growth company. And so effectively, what you have is a company that is probably going to go BK. It'll be interesting to see if whoever the creditors are that take control of the company can go through and cherry pick the WeWorks that are making money. But this is, I don't know, enough already. Put this thing out of its misery. Yeah. Is there room for this kind of thing? Office, like quick office rental space? Because the whole commercial office business has got to be, you got to be crying almost every day.

Well, that's the most interesting thing about this. And that is people will spend some time talking about WeWork and reminiscing, but they're exhausted by it. And the reality is it's gotten about 10 times more media than the significance of the company. What they'll talk about, though, is what it says about the larger commercial real estate decline coming. And this is the next, you know, Greece sovereign debt or the recession. The thing we're going to start wringing our hands over is the structural decline and the pain that's about to be felt in commercial real estate. And like everything else, it's nuanced. There are some buildings in Manhattan that are doing really well. And then there's other buildings in San Francisco that just got sold for 20 or 30%

of their value just a few years ago. But there is going to be a lot of pain. The enduring structural change out of COVID, if you look at e-commerce, even if you look at teen depression, everything is where it would have been had that maintained its growth rates before COVID. In other words, the biggest things, retail, e-commerce, they look, if you didn't know COVID had happened and you just looked at where they are, you wouldn't know that COVID happened. The structural change or the enduring structural change appears to be remote work. Yeah. Yeah, it's true. But, you know, it's morally wrong not to go back to work. I don't know if you know that.

Elon Musk said that in a, the guy who makes cars so we can commute says it's morally wrong not to go back to work. It's morally wrong. In that interview on CNBC. Did you know that? You're committing a moral offense to Elon. People should get off the goddamn moral high horse with their work from home bullshit. Because they're asking everyone else to not work from home while they do.

I was so obligated to say that young people should get into the office. It's a feature, not a bug for young people. It is. It's just going to be a different kind of office. And I wonder if it's going to be more. You wonder if something like WeWork would do better if you create, you know, the one thing that the enduring attraction of WeWork was that they were kind of cool spaces to work in, right? And most offices are really. Oh, and flexibility.

Deadly. Flexibility. And that was, that was to me the most, it wasn't the beer or the kombucha on tap or whatever. I felt it was like it was a nice place to go. You felt okay going to an office. And that's, I think, offices have to rethink that if they want to bring more people in. And in most of the country, people are going back to the office through much of the country, but not in these big cities where people just can have choices and still have more power. But we'll see.

And also, just to pause on WeWork, the real innovation around WeWork. So, first off, it's not innovative to give someone $100 worth of office space and charge them $70. power, but we'll see. And also just to pause on WeWork, the real innovation around WeWork. So first off, it's not innovative to give someone $100 worth of office space and charge them 70. And that's what WeWork essentially has done. They've given you, it's like those mattress companies that were sending you $800 worth of mattress for 600 bucks. It's a great deal for the tenant. The real innovation around WeWork is that if you're an entrepreneur, and I've experienced this, the real estate industry would make you sign five-year leases and one-year deposits. It was just incredibly onerous and inflexible to get into this key

component of organizational value, and that was an office. And they came in and said, just show up, and then you can kind of leave when you want. But enough already. Take this thing out back and put a bullet in its head. All right, then. EU's competition commission says it's game on for Microsoft's acquisition of Activision Blizzard. The approval is conditional. For one thing, the companies have to honor multiple 10-year deals, making Call of Duty available on all gaming platforms. They were going to do this anyway. Why wouldn't they? But the deal still faces hurdles. Last month, regulators in the UK said they planned to block it, and the FTC here in this country sued to do the same. The bid expires in July, but could be extended. What do you think? I mean, the European Commission holds a lot of weight here moving it

forward if they get these conditions. I think it means the deal goes through. if they get these conditions. I think it means the deal goes through. You know, the UK blocking it, the EU is the bigger, I also wonder if it's political at all. I wonder if the EU is kind of fed up with that little Brexit bitch called the UK and has said, all right, you know,

you can scream and get angry and throw your toys on the ground. But Europe is the second largest economy in the world. There's just no getting around this. This is a huge win for Microsoft and probably creates momentum that they'll get the same cross. The FTC is the one. If FTC settles with them and gets conditions, which they'll get, they'll sort of probably

get similar conditions. It'll go through. And no one cares about the UK. Was it Brexit pitch? That's a really lovely term that you just made up. I just made that up. It's almost as good as the German Shepherd showing up in the UK. Was it Brexit pitch? That's a really lovely term that you just made up. I just made that up. It's almost as good as the German Shepherd

showing up in the Subaru. I'm more proud of that. I don't feel that was good. Anyway, yes, we both think this is probably going to go through. I think, you know, they would like to get it.

If they don't, someone else will buy this company. And it looks like the game's in Lena Kahn's corner right now to figure out what kind of conditions she can make it look good that she got some stuff out of them. You interviewed her. And then not have to go through. I did last week.

I just want everyone to know, when Kara's interviewing someone important, who does she call and ask for questions? Who does she call and say, give me a couple questions? By the way, a bunch of hankers do that. Okay. Who does she call second? You. I called you. That's right. That's right.. Okay. Who did she call second? You. I called you.

That's right. That's right. I did. Did you interview her? I did. Yes, I did. Last this week. It's up. It's up.

Thanks for listening. Yes, it's a really good interview with her. And actually, she has a much more – Should we all listen to it? I would say less fire – yes, we should. Less fiery tone. She's learned how to deal in Washington. She seemed very reasonable at the same time firm. She's coming up to speed rather quickly. And still very firm on issues. She sort of whacked at Facebook quite a bit. She called them recidivists, which made me laugh several times. It didn't make Facebook laugh, but I like the word recidivist. She's like, oh, did I say that word? How did I come up with it? She's so smart. It's crazy. But

yes, she's probably going to do a deal with them. She'll do a deal with them. All right, let's get to our first big story. The nation's leading AI entrepreneur wants Congress to regulate artificial intelligence, maybe. Sam Altman, the CEO of OpenAI, went before a Senate subcommittee on Tuesday to answer questions about gender of AI. He was joined by an executive from IBM, but unlike other tech hearings, senators were light with their criticism. They're even kind. They asked Altman about potential rules for AI tools. Here's one exchange between Altman and Senator Blumenthal, who's usually beside himself of Connecticut.

Should we consider independent testing labs to provide scorecards and nutrition labels or the equivalent of nutrition labels? Yeah, I think that's a great idea. I think that companies should put their own sort of, you know, here are the results of our test of our model before we release it. Here's where it has weaknesses. Here's where it has weaknesses. Here's where it has strengths. But also independent audits for that are very important. And I'm excited for a world where companies publish with the models information about how they behave, where the inaccuracies are, and independent agencies or companies provide that as well. I think it's a great idea. It was a love fest. That clip had been

edited a little for clarity, but it was very much a love fest. It was a very information-gathering feeling. They didn't attack him the way they did Zuckerberg, for example. You have tweeted, does he actually want regulation? As you pointed out, Zuckerberg had for example. You have tweeted, does he actually want regulation? You know, as you pointed out, Zuckerberg had said, regulate us while lobbying against regulation. There's no evidence that Altman has lobbied against regulation. He gave $250,000 to the Democratic Super PAC in 2020. He's also donated to California Democrats. He called for three things, a new regulatory agency, a set of safety standards for AI and independent audits of AI models. He didn't call for transparency requirements around

what data was used for training, and he didn't call for prohibitions on using copyrighted works, although that's going to be a mess of trouble for a lot of companies. What do you think? Well, I thought at some point he was also going to call for the important conversation around gender balance or write a book on personal loss. I mean, I just we've been to this movie before. And we live in a country where to be one of the wealthiest people, to be a billionaire means to have people admire you, want your opinion on stuff, to laugh at your jokes. To be a billionaire in the U.S. is to be loved. And, want your opinion on stuff, to laugh at your jokes. To be a billionaire in the U.S. is to be loved, and people want to be loved. I don't think he's a billionaire, just so you know. Okay, yet. Well, he doesn't actually have a stake in this. Okay, all right.

Well, let's play a game. Who said this? We need a more active role for governments and regulation. October of 20. Mark Zuckerberg or Sheryl Sandberg. Okay. No, she said Sandberg calls for government regulation. That was June of 19. Google CEO Sundar Pichai, companies such as ours cannot just build promising new technology and let market forces decide how it will be used. That was June of 20. Twitter CEO Dorsey, generally, I think regulation is a good thing. April of 19.

CEO Nick Clegg, much has been said about Facebook recently, but there's one thing we agree on. Congress should pass new internet regulations. That's October of 20. Snap Spiegel, our guy. We definitely support thoughtful regulation. That was in May of 2022. That is up to Congress not to pass it. I agree.

I don't know. That is up to Congress not to pass it. I agree. I don't know. In this case, I think they are actually trying to be thoughtful and going around early to do these things. Now, whether Congress does anything is another story. Let me say, speaking of people I interviewed, Altman said a lot of what he told me in March when I spoke to him on my other podcast, which will not be named. Except here, he went a bit further.

Let's listen to that. Congressman Ted Lieu said there needs to be an agency dedicated specifically to regulating AI. Is that a good idea? I think people like us that are creating these very powerful systems that could become something properly called AGI at some point, those efforts probably do need a new regulatory effort, and I think it needs to be global body, new regulatory body, and then having existing industry regulators still do their regulation. Who should head that agency in the U.S.? I don't know. Anyway, he had said this very clearly and has been talking about a global body. Same thing Lena Kahn talked about. She

thought she had enough rules in place that she could do the regulation. And so, this is way further along than other previous efforts, I would say. I would have to push back on you on that. I hope you're right. I hope that Sam is true to his word and he seems like a lovely young man. You like him. Everyone I know thinks a lot of him. And every piece of data says that he is full of shit and that he uses two weapons of mass distraction that have been used on us before. One, pretending to want to be regulated. And the new weapon of mass distraction is to refer to this company as the governing body, as a nonprofit. I think a hundred times the original investment goes back to the investors and management before it turns, the money goes back to a nonprofit. So they just shouldn't use the term nonprofit when they're talking about this company.

Yeah, that is true. To create some sort of distraction that somehow they're more noble and not as profit motivated as everybody else. So I agree. This was a love fest. We have the Restrict Act. We have antitrust and Amy Klobuchar. And there's always a lot of head nodding. We always think we're going to get something done.

So you're right. Let's move to the part where we actually create that regulatory body. I think the first regulatory body should probably be or hopefully we can walk and shoot down at the same time. I like to be a division of NATO. I think we need cross-border multilateral agency looking at this from a defense standpoint. I do think this is a defense issue, but enough already. Appoint somebody, get the commission going, have it be ground up, start with people who have technology backgrounds. But I just feel, I'm sorry, we've been here before

and we always get our hearts broken. Well, let's talk about, I would agree. I would agree. But I think one, this particular technology is not protected the way the other one is. So they knew there was nothing they could do. And so there is liability. So they're going to tread much more lightly.

There's all kinds of significant copyright problems. There's going to be another hearing on that coming up. I do think Congress is doing the right thing doing these meetings. This was a little bit of a love fest, I would agree. I don't necessarily think they have to smack them. But it was more of a fact-finding mission. And I don't mind them doing that for a short amount of time. You know, but let's talk about specific things. We got a listener question via email. Let's read it out. Dear Mr. and Mrs. Swisher. That's funny.

Do you think audio and visual media should have information about how much of the content written or performed is generated by AI? Do you think there will be some kind of labeling system like organic food that media will adopt so the customers at least have some idea of what they are consuming? Thank you, Lars. Well, Lars, I think that is a great idea. And actually, so does Sam Altman. It's not a bad idea. Like, where's the provenance of things? I think you're going to have to have some sense of where they collated all your information from so you can judge it.

I don't know. Scott, what do you think about that one? I think it's a good idea. And it gets to one of the economic points, and that is, if you're, I've been spending a lot of time, or I was spending time in something, you know, called a writer's room, and we've been talking a lot about the writer's strike, and I said, and if you feed into an LLM every episode of Modern Family such that you can help write the next great sitcom about an American

family, those writers should be compensated. There should be some sort of tool that not only indicates what percentage is AI generated. And quite frankly, I don't think the consumer is going to care as long as they feel like it's good information or more importantly, it makes them feel good about themselves, whether it's misinformation or not. But what you're going to need is you're going to need something similar to what the record industry has done a decent job of in the music industry. And that is if you're KROQ 106.7, the greatest radio station in the history of mankind, and you play a bunch of B-52 songs, another amazing band, they at the end of the year send you a bill and say, okay, you've used this content to build your company. There's going to need to be some sort of likely AI generative model that says, this is where you have fed the LLM. This is the input to the LLM, and we need to compensate them. Yeah, and I think a lot of these companies have been, including ChatG OpenAI, about the details of the sources of data and all kinds of things. They're trying to keep quiet about its training

techniques, the amount of computing power. And so they're a lot less open because there is more competition. That's not a surprise. bullshit. Whether it was Marissa Mayer standing in front of Senator John Kerry saying about Google, well, it's, and he's saying the Seattle Post-Intelligence just went out of business in about two years because their classified business is gone. And she was like, well, it's early, Senator. I mean, I just, we've been here before. Anyway. I would agree. So what would a regulatory agency look like and who should head it besides me? I would say the following. The most important thing is to get a regulatory body going. The second most important thing is to ensure that when someone takes an uber Kalanick-like approach with their generative AI and starts doing

mendacious shit because they're like move fast and break things, that they get hit really hard really early. I think the algebra of deterrence needs to be set here that, okay, we're going to err on the side of prosecuting people that start generating misinformation around certain categories. Regardless of whether or not you think you're an innovator, regardless if a name brand VC has given you money, that shit's not going to hunt here. I think early and often. Yeah, well, it might not have the same First Amendment issues that stymie social media regulation. And as I said, may not be protected by Section 230. There is a lot more, you know, they can't just bring in false First Amendment free speech arguments that they often tend to make that sometimes are applicable and most times are not. So that's that. It's, you know, they have liability just the way The New York Times does or anybody else. or a legitimate medical journal that vaccines alter your DNA, it may be really difficult to reverse engineer it to the source. But let me, I want to circle back. I don't want to be a total Debbie Downer on this. The most positive thing about, in my view, all of this is that this is likely, I believe this is the most enduring technology since probably mobile. People say

since web, I People say since web, I would say since mobile. This is really exciting. And the really wonderful thing is it's American. The best companies in the world doing this are in America. And that gives us an edge on our adversaries. That's going to spawn incredible economic growth. I think this is going to result in job creation, not job destruction. The most innovative product of the last 50 years has been the vaccines. And this is a close, probably number three behind either the web or mobile, and it's American. So that's very... Yeah, it's American. That said, when I interviewed him, and he also said it in Congress yesterday, he called for an international body,

which I tend to agree, he compared it to the International Atomic Energy Agency. That said, nuclear arms and power have always been products of the government, not individuals and individual companies. And so that's a little different here. So how do you regulate private companies? You could sort of link it, I think, more to like CRISPR and cloning and things like that than you necessarily would the government. But it's certainly, it has to be, there has to be an international standards body of what you can't make, like killer robots, no, yes on this, no on this. And so there's sort of rules of the road from the get-go.

And that's what's most important is who is gonna be the, it should be the US leading this effort to create this international body. Probably should come out of the State Department, or I'm not sure where it should. I mean, it could come out of the president. It's got to come from the executive branch. I was also at dinner with Tony Blinken, and he was very interested in the State Department being part of it.

So I don't know which one would push forward, the Commerce Department. There's National Defense. There's some sort of regulatory body to ensure that, you know, it doesn't get out of control or we create this, you know, move even further into a post-truth society. But there's even three or four levels down beyond that. The thing I am most worried about AI is that I see this terrible trend that stuck during COVID. And that is people, specifically young people, are using some sort of digital form of a relationship where they think they have friends, but they're not experiencing friendship. and rather than taking the risk of going out and making friends, meeting mentors, finding mates, they try and find some weak, low-risk facsimile, whether it's Netflix or Tinder or porn, that decreases their motivation to socialize with other people. And the result is a slow slip into depression. And I wonder with open AI, or I worry about open AI, if we're going to be able to create everything from fake friends, fake girlfriends, and reasonably good sex bots, where we have an entire generation of young people that mistake friends and relationships for friendship and actual relationships. And become more and more sequestered from each other.

I mean, literally, the movie Her is playing out. I guess. I don't know. I didn't like that movie. Anyway, I'll have to go back and rewatch it. I kind of, the director asked me what I thought, and I was like, eh, like, at the time. I don't know. It's just that's the first thing is really.

That thing was ahead of its time. It'll send chills down your spine when you watch it again. I'll watch it now. All right. Okay. Or go, yeah, probably a better film. What is it? Ex Machina?

Machina? Ex Machina? Ex Machina? Yeah, yeah. That one. Yeah. That one I thought was great. I just, the fact is the AI was part of it, and I think the AI could care less.

And that's, I could see a person falling in love with AI. I can't see an AI falling in love with a person. And one of the most rewarding things in life is to have real desire, real pining. There's a reason that romantic comedies are two hours, not 10 minutes. And we're creating a world with low calorie, low reward relationships where there's no obstacles or no disappointment. And it leads to a lack of life. It leads to a lack of victory. It leads to a lack of victory of, you know, it's really exciting, speaking for a friend, to get asked to prom at a different school when four girls at your own high school say no to you.

Yeah, you said that. I can say this firsthand. It's really exciting when you ask four girls to your prom at university high school and they all say no. And then someone asks you to their prom at a different school. I asked four girls and they all said no. Oh, wow. But that's school. Scott. I asked four girls and they all said no. Oh, wow. But that's life. Ouch. That's the wonder and the victory of life.

And instead, we're like, I know I'll have a fake relationship on a digital platform that's enhanced by AI, and I'll never know real desire, and I'll never know real victory. Interesting. Scott, stay away from the AI. That's all I have to say. I'm not going to tell you that I went to all four proms. That is unfair. That is unfair. Good for you.

Anyway, Scott, I had lots of boyfriends and I'm a lesbian, so think about it that way. All right, Scott, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, we'll talk about the new TikTok ban at West and take a listener question about the future of writing. 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. Out. Uncertainty. Self-doubt. Stressing about not knowing where to start. In. Plans and guides that make it easy to get home projects done. Out. Word art. Sorry, Live Laugh Lovers. 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 on our second big story. Bad news for fans of air fryers and crocodile videos in Montana. On Wednesday, the state became the first in the union to ban TikTok. Governor Greg Gianforte signed the ban into law. It imposes a fine on app stores that

let users download the TikTok app. It also fines TikTok itself. If it operates in the state, there are no fines for TikTok users. This ban is set to take effect on January 1st of next year. Of course, it'll be overturned. Both TikTok and the ACLU issued harsh statements accusing the bill of violating the First Amendment. It completely does. This is such endless fucking virtual signaling by these dumb, body-slamming governor of Montana. The states should have no business here except for maybe banning TikTok and government things. It's just, they really need to stop.

This is such, they were busy. They finished doing their anti-trans stuff, anti-trans performer bills, and then moved on to this one. They really should focus on roads and other issues in Montana, but they didn't. What do you think? I'm not sure I see the two as being equivalent. I don't – It's just a waste of time.

It's a waste of time for – I love the great state of Montana. I think it's incredibly beautiful. I don't like TikTok. I'd like it to be banned. But you're right. It probably doesn't make sense for states to start banning media. It's ridiculous.

There is a real danger from China. But our governor from Montana is not going to help anything. And he's going to ruin it, too, at the same time because he's shredding the Constitution. You're right. I agree. It'll be torched by the courts. There's lots of ways to do it. And instead, this guy just wants to jump out in front of,

I don't know, Christine Ohm or whoever the fuck is going to do it somewhere else. It's literally, the reason I'm comparing it to the trans thing is they all just got on the thing when they should be doing stuff for the people in the state of Montana. It's not going to work. It's endless bullshit.

And this guy has no business being just get off, get on the porch, young, young man. It's not like it's not like he's a governor telling principals what pronouns they can use in schools. Oh, wait, that's Florida. I'm sure he does have a bill like that. Oh, come on. They have whatever they are. All these states are doing these meaningless. The next one will be that lady in Arkansas.

They all want to be president. And they can't inflame the crazies in every other state by just making sure the fire department and the police department are working effectively. I can't stand it when governors run for Senate and vice versa. They are totally different jobs. One's lawmaking and legislative. One is an operational job. One is you're supposed to make sure the roads work, that when it rains, the sewers are actually working.

There's not enough water. Deal with water issues, governor. I mean, come on. This is bullshit. And by the way, it also gets in the way of actual things our government needs to do around this particular company. I'm with you on this, Kara Swisher. I'm with you. I'm just you on this, Kara Swisher. I'm with you.

I'm just pissed at this guy. We stand together. I will go out on a limb here and I'll say he's being, even if he's being truthful, he's not being neutral. He's not being truthful. Oh, stop it. You stop that. Listen, don't insult her because I will come to Florida.

I will fly to Miami and slap you. I love Christiane Amanpour. You know, look, this also gives TikTok a lot of high ground that it probably deserves in this moment. But it doesn't allow you to really look at this correctly. And, of course, they've been deploying ads. You know, the senator said that. Everyone's a TikTok lobbyist. This is overreach on every single thing.

Speaking of right-wingers and social media, Elon Musk tweeted an attack on George Soros this week, likened the billionaire to X-Men villain Magneto, and said he wants to erode the fabric of civilization. Actually, Elon is eroding the fabric of civilization. One thing he didn't mention is Soros sold over 100,000 shares of Tesla stock in the first quarter. He said, of course, asked about his tweets and the conspiracy theories could alienate customers and hurt his business. He paused for quite a while because that's what he does. It's a part of his little stunt. And I'm a genius and I must think for a minute thing. And let's listen to what he said.

I'll say what I want to say. And if the consequence of that is losing money, so be it. Said every three-year-old toddler wanting to keep his truck everywhere in the world. Anyway, he certainly went on to say what he wanted. Here is later in the interview arguing that the man who killed eight people in Texas earlier this month was not a white supremacist, even though everyone else does, including the state of Texas. Go ahead. Ascribing it to white supremacy was bullshit. Okay. And there's no proof, by the way, that he was not. There's no proof. I would say that there's no proof that he is.

And that's a debate you want to get into on Twitter? Yes. Because we should not be ascribing things to white supremacy if it's false. Yes. You shall not besmirch the good name of white supremacy. Didn't he have a swastika tattoo? Yes, yes, yes, yes. And the state of Texas.

That's kind of a tell, isn't it? Mm-hmm. He had hundreds of posts online that including neo-Nazi material and white supremacy. I honestly, you know, you don't want to say bad things to someone from South Africa, but boy, is it bleeding through that terrible history of that country. One of the many things that bothered me about it, I have never understood the conspiracy theory and the hate that George Soros evokes. And for Elon Musk to say about anybody that they hate humanity, that's what he said about George Soros.

George Soros hates humanity. George Soros is a Holocaust survivor. George Soros spends a dramatic amount of his wealth trying to promote democracy and freedom around the world. And I'm sorry, he hates humanity. So I don't, that is a really, that is a very aggressive thing to say about somebody. You know, I don't like, I mean, I don't like Elon Musk. I would never say that about him. But again, he's trying to go red pill. I think he's angry that he sold his stock. Yeah, that to me. I've never understood. And Bill Gates gets some of that too. I'm like, thank God that we have

these people who make so much goddamn money and then turn around and think, OK, you know, Bill Gates says, I'm going to try and cure infectious diseases. And George Soros says, I'm going to try and protect democracies all around the world. I'm like, well, OK, billionaires could could do a lot worse. I've never understood this this red pill hate for George Soros. I just don't get it. This whole thing, besides George Soros, pretending this guy isn't exactly what he is. I feel like if you have Nazi tattoos and several, you might be a Nazi. That's just me. Or you might like them. You might enjoy them. You might enjoy their repertoire. And I don't even know why he's picking this fight. And can you imagine Linda Iaccarino going, oh, wait, this is all she's going to do. He's going to say, and he doesn't care about money. Like he does. Yeah, shareholders would like to have a word. So do advertisers. Yeah. But well, there's no shareholders of Twitter, but,

and except his friends who just, I'm like, oh, Elon. By the way, Tesla said it was going to advertise for the first time on, and that, that's what he said. That was a big takeaway from that. They said they need advertising. That's a problem. It usually just marked it on his, his, his fame. You know, they use that for years and years. At one point in one of their, in one of their filings, they said, historically, we've been able to generate significant media coverage of our company and our vehicles and believe we will continue to do so, was alluding to Musk. To date, the vehicle sales, media coverage, and word of mouth have been primary drivers of our sales leads and have helped achieve sales without advertising, traditional advertising, and relatively low marketing costs. Now they might advertise. Thoughts?

So, and I will bring this back to the story but two nights ago when was it i got a call from stephanie rule saying come on the 11th hour with cara it'll be great with cara and i'm like what are we talking about and he said well we're gonna talk about elon musk i'm like i'm out i'm gonna go drink i'm done talking about this guy he lives rent free too much in my head and i want to know about advertising yeah but i've got a bunch of calls from media outlets saying we comment on elon in advertising and i looked at what he said i think it's just one of his things where he just said it off the top of his head i don't think it means anything i don't one of the in my opinion one of the really most innovative things about tesla is that is that elon musk has

massively leveraged twitter and new mediums to get the equivalent of billions of dollars in free advertising. And one of the reasons that Tesla has much greater margins than the other automobile companies is they spend almost nothing on advertising. It's like Lee Iacocca, right? And as a professor of brand strategy who made his living preaching about the power of intangible assets resulting in a rational margin and advertising. The reality is advertising to a certain extent kind of outs you as not getting it. And if you think about the best products in the world and the best companies in the world, show me a company that's aggregated or acquired or accreted more than $100 billion in market cap within say say, 36 months. And

I'll show you a company that doesn't really advertise like a traditional company in its sector. So this was another head fake to get a headline. I doubt they're even going to do it. They don't think they're going to do it. I think they're going to need to. I don't think people are as hot on Tesla as they are to find a way to sell them. Yeah. I think they're going to need to. They're going to need to be doing their advertising. I don't think they can avoid it with the competition. There's too much. Yeah.

He gets so much. He can, I mean, keep in mind. Negative now. Negative attention now. Before it was largely positive. You know, and the same thing on Twitter. He's got at some point, he's got to get advertisers to want to advertise there, right? Maybe Tesla can advertise on Twitter.

That's a key point because this is the trick that Google and Meta used to do. First, they throw parties and they call these advertisers and people their partners as they basically put a gun to their head and execute them. But they used to advertise a little bit, right, to maintain good relationships with their quote-unquote partners. Can you help us? We're going to spend a little money, throw them a bone. Here's kind of your last meal. And we want to, Amazon would advertise a little around the holidays. And I don't know if they were testing it, if they were sincere about it, or they just wanted to maintain, you know, throw a few bones at the people that they were putting out of business.

Except he needs advertising compared to them. They didn't need it. I think they do. I think Tesla needs it. I think they do. Look, the margins were down. The numbers were down. It's only, these aren't going up. These are not going up because of him anymore. They're not. That's a function of competition. The question is, the question is. No, it's also him.

It's like, he's rejected. I literally, and I'm not just talking to like, a lot of people are like, oh, I'm looking at the, I have gotten so many emails and calls from people,

not, they don't say they're woke people because they're not. They're like, what else is out there? Like, that's the nature of people, right?

They want something fresh. So, I don't know. I think he needs to advertise and I think it's a very big issue. What else is out there? Like, that's the nature of people, right? They want something fresh. Yeah, they want some great cars now. So, I don't know. I think he needs to advertise, and I think it's a very big expense. What you're saying, though, is that advertising offers an ROI. How is it going to get people to buy the cars if other cars are just as good and prettier? Honestly, they're all prettier than the Tesla now. Well, I mean, that's a different issue. That's a product problem.

But what you have is the companies have added a lot of value. It used to be, I mean, I'm thinking about watching the entire, I love watching an entire series with my kid and my 15-year-old and I just ripped through Game of Thrones, which is probably inappropriate, but it's bonding. I would like to watch the entire Mad Men series again. I just thought it was amazing and so interesting. And it's such a lesson on kind of the diet. It's such a great period piece. And it's also a really interesting insight into work and advertising. And when I came of professional age, a good ad campaign could literally change the trajectory of a company. Like Kia or Hyundai, I forget who it was, had this amazing ad campaign. And it literally increased their market share three points, which is enormous in the world of automobiles.

That doesn't happen anymore because people aren't glued to their TVs. People with any money aren't watching ad-supported media. Product innovation went through this massive golden age, unlocked with digital innovation. And all of a sudden, product and innovation and supply chain innovation became the way you built your brand, not advertising. So I'm not even sure.

A limited amount? Sure. But I don't know. At the golden age of Don, Don Draper has been drawn. Well, I don't know how they're going to sell cars then because someone's got,

this guy is getting negative attention and he doesn't care if it has consequences. But advertising isn't going to save him from himself. Yep. He needs to butt the fuck out of this stuff and just work on the products. That's all he needs to do. But he's not going to do it.

Okay, Scott, let's pivot to a listener question. You've got, you've got, I can't believe I'm going to be a mailman. You've got mail. This question comes from two. Hi, Kara and Scott, not Mr. and Mrs. Swisher. As an independent author, I've been watching the rise of narrative AI with interest. Right now, their prose is fever dreams, but it's going to improve. Do you see a future for human authors? And if AI written books flood the market, what can human creatives do to stand out? Thank you. Two-verd. I don't know, Scott.

What do you think? Do you like the idea of him being married to me? Be honest. I don't. I'm thinking of seeking a divorce. Yeah, I'm going to hire a very high-priced divorce attorney. I've already talked to every divorce lawyer in town to contaminate them. Thanks, Tom.

I had the best divorce in the world. It was called my divorce, tragically amicable. We're still friends. That's what actually made it more sad. Like, wait, why are we getting divorced again? Mine was amicable too. Ours is going to be ugly though. Ugly. AI-written books flood the market.

Can human creatives do to stand out? Can you stay on topic? Are you planning to divorce me? I am since the beginning. I just want you for your money and your apartments. I want the apartment in the settlement. Said every woman in my life, quite frankly. Yeah, exactly.

I think I deserve it, honestly. Yeah. I really, in a weird way, I really do put out for you. Anyway, human creatives, what can they do to stand up? Answer two's question. That was good. I know. I'm getting better at these sex jokes. Every technology has a similar effect, and that is it consolidates the

market. And it basically, if you're a middling lawyer drafting leases, vanilla leases, you're in a lot of trouble. If you're a writer who just does okay work but not great work, watch out. Here it comes. But if you're a thoughtful person that's creative and knows how to, AI is not going to take your job. Someone who understands AI is going to take your job. And this is, I'm already using Notion AI, one of our advertisers. And I will take, so for example, I will take, we're talking about, and this is going to be scary, about starting something called, you know, the original AI Prof G and feed in my book, my most recent book on, I wrote something called The Algebra of Wealth, feed in every transcript from every

Prof G podcast and create a generative AI that could potentially answer questions. and create a generative AI that could potentially answer questions. But the thing is, the thing you feed into it is what makes it original or different. And so if you're someone who can produce really great original work, your compensation is going to go up. If you're someone that needs to constantly rely on generative AI for other stuff, you're probably in trouble. But if you're doing original work and using generative AI to help you, to inspire you, to fill in gaps, to make stuff better, you're going to become a warrior. So this doesn't make you obsolete, it makes mediocre people

obsolete. And what will happen is there'll be unbelievable new businesses and there'll be new adjuncts and new services and new jobs created by these little companies. And they'll become medium and big size companies to do really cool things with generated AI. There is an interesting thing. This guy named Jake Ward on Twitter put, we took a website from zero to 750K a month SEO traffic using 100% AI generated content. to 750k a month SEO traffic using 100% AI-generated content. 7k total pages generated hit 300k a month after six months, 750 after 12, 4k plus keywords in positions one and three, 13k plus keywords in positions four through 10. He did this whole breakdown.

And to me, it's demand media AI edition is what it's doing for that market, right? If you remember Demand Media, who kind of was a content farm. And this is a version of a content farm. And he's right, mediocre, you're fucked. Any press releases, earnings releases, things like that, anything that can be done in this way, then a human checks it, sure, is gone. And even, and much stuff is, much marketing material is just, it's easy to copy. It's easy to do.

And so that's really, you have to be creative, really hyper creative. Look, there's certain industries that are just going to, I've always thought that disruption is more a function of how ripe the industry is. I don't think, I think everyone's talking about writers right now. And I do have a prediction around the writer's strike. But I think the industry that's going to,

there's the mother of all chins right now is healthcare. I would not want to be a pathologist or virologist or radiologist right now, because there's no reason. Radiologists have already been under siege, yeah. There's no reason why, you know, AI is really good at looking at patterns and then predicting, all right, if you give me a million data points, I'll give you with really great accuracy what the million and first data point will be. And it strikes me that looking at stuff under a microscope and trying to understand what is the pathogen here, that AI is just going to do that better. And we've been over, I don't want to say we've been overpaying these people because the in practitioners haven't done

as well, but the insurance company and the people have inserted themselves in the middle in the pharma companies. You got to think that that's where AI is really going to boom. Yeah, it's going to be a real. But books, too, I'm sorry to tell you, there's a lot of mediocre writing out there. And this will be mediocre for you. And mediocre but necessary, banal but needed. You just have to have it around like here's your explanation for this and that and the other thing so there's you just you don't have the imagination big enough to figure out where this is going but we have to move on but

go ahead but the last point you like i like you've all know harry the guy who wrote sapien yeah harari him with armed with ai his next book I can't even imagine the kind of content he's going to be able to produce because the way his mind works, his ability to connect instinct with human behavior and what the future might look like, I just don't think any AI can come up with that. But what he'll be able to do is say, all right, give me a history of Homo sapiens in this era and what happened. And he will have just a level of rigor and research he didn't have access to before. Yeah, if as long as it's from good sources, that's the thing.

So we'll have to see. But you still require creativity and a certain flair. Yuval has a beautiful writing style, I think. creativity and a certain flair. Yuval has a beautiful writing style, I think. So that is you can start to mimic it, but it's still very hard to mimic certain people, like Scott Galloway, for example.

God! No generative AI comes up with a German shepherd driven by us. My ex-husband Scott Galloway, my ex. That's right. My ex. My soon-to-be ex. I'm taking the kids, albeit my sisters. If you've got a question of your own and you'd like them answered, send it our way. Go to nymag.com slash pivot to submit a question for the show or call 855-51-PIVOT.

All right, Scott, one more quick break. We'll be back for predictions. 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 policies apply details at fizz.ca okay scott let's hear a prediction so in the 80s in Britain, the coal miners, I think it was the national... You're doing a coal mining prediction? But go ahead. I'm setting it up. I don't want to be replaced by AI. I'm trying to provide some creative context here. All right.

So I think it was the National Minecrafters or Mine Workers Union took on Margaret Thatcher. And basically Thatcher said, this is my moment to show that I'm the Iron Lady. We need to move to different types of energy. And just said no over and over and basically broke the back of the coal miners union. The same thing's about to happen here with the writers. They have the same skill set or a similar skill set to authors, to journalists, and they make a lot more money. In addition, this is a dream come true for the studios and enforced multilateral pause in spending as they recalibrate and have cloud cover to come back with fewer employees. The union here, the writers union union has so badly miscalculated

the power dynamic here. And the studios are going to slowly but surely, quietly, they are going to break their backs. And this is going to end really poorly for the writers. It's going to end... I wouldn't be surprised if we found out that the studio heads got together and said, piss off and upset the writers union. So they go on strike and force all of us to stop spending in producing content. Because every individual is like, I got eight shows I haven't gotten to yet that I'd like to watch. So this is going to be remnant. This is the information age coal miner strike in the UK. It's going to end really poorly for the writers. They are totally, and all this virtue signaling with stars and make 10 and $20 million a year showing up and

pretending that they stand with their brothers and sisters. I just think it's hilarious. You're going to see this union come back to the table and the studios are going to just do what used to happen to me when I was trying to raise money through the 90s with VCs. They're going to grin fuck them. They're going to say, that's interesting. Riders are really important to us. We should keep talking and they're going to do nothing. And then when a bunch of the riders that are going to be replaced by AI anyways, start thinking, I can't pay my rent and start putting pressure on the union to settle. The union is going to end up with a worse deal than they had going into this thing. So my anyways start thinking, I can't pay my rent and start putting pressure on the union to settle, the union's going to end up with a worse deal than they had going into this thing. So my prediction,

the information age equivalent of the British coal miner strike is happening with the writer's strike, and it's going to end the same way. Who's Margaret Thatcher? So the studio heads are Margaret Thatcher. You don't get my analogy? I thought that was pretty good. I do. I get it. I agree with you. A bunch of writers and actors have written me, and I'm like, I think you're, I don't think you have leverage here. I don't see the leverage. Maybe I'm missing it. Well, you know who the culprit is? We're creative. We're creative is not enough leverage, and I applaud writers. They're angry. They're angry at the studio heads. The real culprit is all the kids who work for me at Prof G. They don't watch ad-supported TV. They all watch TikTok. 850 million creators on TikTok. Assume 1% of them are any good. They have so misread the situation. And if I were a studio head, I would be thinking, oh my God, thank God for this union. They have given us a gift. union. They have given us a gift. Yeah. I don't know how many, their signs are creative. They're just the leverage. I don't see it. I don't see it. I get, I'm getting a lot of angry letters from

writers, but I'm sorry to tell you, I'm not sure what you should ask for. And I agree it's, but they're going to be smaller writers rooms. They just don't want to pay as much and they're not going to have to on some level. And, and, is creating a disgruntled group of creatives that work for you eventually because you do need creativity to really do well. But I have to say the leverage is not there. I think you're right. Good prediction, Scott. Good prediction. Do you have anything to care?

What? No, I don't have a prediction. I'm just right. I just reported and I'm correct. This is second week in a row. I don't know what I'm going to do the third week in a row. I'll think of something. I got two in a row so far.

I've got to think about what I want to. Unfortunately, I'm often right about Elon Musk stuff. Unfortunately, I'm often right. Yeah, that's your biggest problem, how right you are. Here's one. I had a whole show on it with Ryan Mack and Zoe Schiffer today about it. But one thing that came out that Ryan just tweeted was about some guy suing him who was working on their operations team. And, like, they wanted to install shitty locks in offices that would put people in danger and said, just do it because no one will catch us.

Like, this guy is alleging this. I just – every time I think I'm, like, disappointed, I'm like, you're kidding me. Like, really? Anyway, it's just, I don't have a prediction, except that I'm always surprised by how the depths of bad behavior. Anyway, Scott, that's the show. We'll be back on Tuesday with more Pivot. Can you read us out?

Today's show was produced by Lara Naiman, Evan Engel, and Taylor Griffin. Ernie Andertot engineered this episode. Thanks also to Drew Burrows and Neil Silverio. Make sure you subscribe to the show wherever you listen to podcasts. Thanks for listening to Pivot from New York Magazine and Vox Media. We'll be back next week for another breakdown

of all things tech and business. Cara, my wife, have a great weekend.