Pivot - The U.K. piles on Facebook

Episode Date: December 7, 2018

Kara and Scott talk about the latest dump of emails exposing Facebook management’s malfeasance, but Scott thinks it’s just the U.K. piling on.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Pivot is brought to you by our founding sponsor, Smartwater. What makes Smartwater delicious? It's pure, it's crisp, it's vapor distilled with electrolytes added for taste. Learn more at drinksmartwater.com. Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher. And I'm Scott Galloway. Well, Scott, how are you doing? Where are you calling from today?

I am what appears to be a closet somewhere in downtown Manhattan, and a handsome bearded millennial just showed me to my closet, and I can see him turning red. So he's not only handsome, he's humble. And of course, my Sherpa, Rebecca. This is all probably more information than you wanted. Yeah, we have a lot of handsome millennials wandering around. I'm in New York. People have a bearded and handsome man. A millennial and handsome is redundant because I find anyone under the age of 30 just kind of,

you know, they all look just young and eager and nice. Yes, they are. They're very nice employees of Vox Media. I am actually in San Francisco for a New York Minute, and I'm heading back that way via Vegas. Vegas. Vegas, baby. You just couldn't stay away, right?

I couldn't. I'm going to see Barry Diller, Dara Khosrowshahi, and Andy Jassy at an event. Okay. I was wondering how long before the name dropping would start. Thank you. I just did that. A minute 10 into it. The reason I'm asking is because the topic is the power of platforms, and I wanted to

get your insight on what I should say, and then we want to get into the big stories this week. Like, what should I say to these people about the power of platforms? I want a line from you that I can deliver onto them. I would just ask, I don't know, the most powerful platforms are the ones that seem to get away with, have replaced profits with vision and growth. And I would just ask Uber, have you rechanged the dynamic where, for some reasons, losses of the new black? What's going on here? You're losing a billion bucks. Good, good. What about AWS? Oh, Amazon Web Services?

Yeah, that's the guy who runs it, Andy Jassy, the most powerful man you don't know. That company will be spun by the end of 19 and be one of the 10 most valuable companies in the world on the spin. And I would ask him directly, what do you think of the idea of spinning AWS and why wouldn't you? Yeah, okay, good. See, that's why I dropped those names so hard. I needed your help. I need your help. Oh, yeah. Speaking of dropping things on the Okay, good. See? That's why I dropped those names so hard. There you go. I needed your help. I need your help. Speaking of dropping things on the ground, Facebook, there was a trove of UK parliament,

UK has had it with Facebook, and they've released 250 personal emails, and it shows that Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg used access to user data over the years to hurt competition. Facebook said the emails were cherry-picked.

And again, Mark is responding on Facebook about the thing. What do you think of this? I mean, again, it's the... And then Sheryl Sandberg was more violent for Sheryl Sandberg all over the place and how she was responsible for everything. Dual-class shareholder stocks. And so talk about... A lot of people are calling for the FTC

and others to look into this. You have a different take, which is unusual, I think, because you're usually a Facebook basher, I would say. Yeah, I'm a big critic, bad for the country, bad for the planet. But if you read through the emails,

and I think you're writing a story on this, I don't know if it's in the Times or somewhere else, but I would argue there's no real news here. The activity and the dialogue is somewhat typical of a company that is trying to crush its competition. And I would bet there's emails like that. My company, there's emails like this at Vox.

And it's clear the trend here is everyone's piling on. email that everyone seems sensitive to is the email around Vine, that the moment Vine or Twitter announced a six-second video product called Vine, they decided to basically shut it out of Facebook and turn off certain features that would make it difficult. What they failed to disclose in all these stories, which gives you, you know, which lends this notion that people are just piling on, is that soon before that or recently before that, Twitter had done the same thing to Facebook. Yeah, Instagram, right. Well, they said they wouldn't let Facebook properties use their find friend feature on Twitter. So there's nothing new. They did a bunch of stuff for sure.

It was back and forth. There's nothing new here. The thing that's interesting is that it's not the competitive instincts and the fullbody contact decisions that are part of capitalism competition. The thing that's scary is that if you have one player that when they make those decisions can basically turn the oxygen off in the room for any company. And I would argue this highlights a failure of the DTC and the DOJ, because if you have four of the five top apps owned by one company, they can kind of put their foot on the windpipe of almost any company trying to make a living in the app economy. So I think it's a bigger issue, but I would argue Facebook and Mr. Zuckerberg and Sherwood are sort of doing their jobs in

these instances. What's your take on this? I agree. I agree. I was like, what a surprise. Like people are like, oh, can you believe they're using people's data? I'm like, yeah, I believe it. And it's sort of like saying, can you believe Donald Trump sent something awful on Twitter? It's like, yeah, okay. And I It's sort of like saying, can you believe Donald Trump sent something awful on Twitter? It's like, yeah, okay. And I think one of the things that people don't realize is how, you know, I was at an event last night, and I'm going to drop another name, Sam Altman, who runs Y Combinator. It was at this great

new place called Manny's in San Francisco, which we're going to do a live podcast from there when you're here. It's this new space for civic and political and discourse, and we're doing a lot of live podcasts from there. And one of the things I kept saying to the crowd, they were like, well, should they have been better?

I'm like, they're a business. Let's keep in mind they all kept the money and they're a giant business. They're a business. Stop pretending you're not businesses. And businesses do things. I think the issue is a lot of these companies, they sort of slather on the we're doing good,

we're wearing hoodies, we're drinking kombucha. And so it hides the fact that they're just like Wall Street people or cigarette manufacturers or chemical companies. You know what I mean? It's the same. To me, they make the money and they'll do what it takes to make the money. They're not concerned with the condition of our soul. They're not going to take care of us when we get older. And the piece of advice I would have to some of our listeners out there just starting their career is that I've never understood the notion of being loyal to an institution. An institution is an inanimate legal construct filed in Delaware. You should be loyal to people. But when I see people talk about making career decisions over their loyalty to

institutions, I feel that's a construct, and I'm going to go way off script here. I think that's a construct that's been built into our society, mostly so young people would go put themselves in harm's way to maintain the land of older rich people. But this notion of being loyal to an institution, it just doesn't make any sense to me. It's like at NYU, they talk about loyalty to the university. I'm like, no, you should be loyal to people that treat you well. The institution, it does not exist. And it's not going to, it's not going to, you know, take care of you when you're dying. And I don't know how we got here, Kara. Where am I?

I like it. I like that you're going into the thing because, you know, it's true. I mean, you have to look at these companies. I think people did put little hopes and dreams in them a little bit because they were not just another thing. There was actually a great piece in Pace this week that I liked, and they said, there's a small elite bankrolled by really rich people. The elite push austerity onto the public. The public supports

progressive goals and hates the elite. That's the story. These aren't two tribes anymore than Al Capone and his victims were tribes. It's pretty simple. There's a ruling class. They like each other. They don't like you. That's the history behind every Bush and Michelle Obama picture or what. And it goes on and it says, privilege looks in the mirror and calls the site beautiful.

And it was really true. I was like, these people are just powerful. That's poetry. That's poetry. Anyway, speaking of powerful and people getting increasingly richer, Lyft apparently has done its confidential IPO filing thing that they all do.

I don't understand. What have you heard? That was big news. It feels to me they're just trying to say, I'm first, I'm first. They have to be first. Right. They have to be first, right? I mean, analyze this, please. Because I think Uber's going to go out, obviously, but they've got to go out before Uber. Well, you got to give Lyft props. People thought the game was over. Lyft is one of the greatest, I don't want to even call it comeback stories, but carving out a niche. I think probably the best example of that is I thought that the voice game was over last year,

Alexa had 70% share, and then Google came in and carved out 20, 25% share in just 12 months time. But I would say kind of four or five years ago, we thought the game was over, that it was Uber and the seven dwarfs. And Lyft has carved out a nice niche, mostly through, I imagine, good execution and some of the missteps on behalf of Uber. But I don't, tell me what is the difference between Uber and Lyft, culturally, economically, business model? What is the difference? I don't think they have a moat. You know, I talk a lot about moats. I think we've talked about it, the idea that Amazon has built all these moats. I'm not so sure. Uber has a brand

moat. They have the credit cards. Those are the two things they have. It's a brand that people know. So that's nothing. And they have the credit cards and the relationship. And they're like a utility and they work well most of the time. Both of them work well. And so I think it really is just getting the drivers satisfied, getting the customer experience down.

But I think it'll be harder for Lyft to compete. But the fact of the matter is they've got to go public before Uber does in order to get out into the markets. And what do you think these companies, say they do get public, it'll set a proxy for the valuation for Uber, which I can't imagine is going to be anywhere near the $120 billion that bankers call them.

Yeah, especially with the recent announcement of the losses, the billion dollars in losses a quarter. That's a lot of money. But do you know the guys... It's a lot of money. But do you know the guys— It's a lot of Saudi money. There you go. Talk about the management at Lyft. We always talk about Dara.

We always talk about Travis. Who are the key players at Lyft, and what's your impression of the culture there? John Zimmer, for example. They're very earnest, comparatively. They come from a much more hippie, I don't know how to use the word hippie, that's not a word, but you know what I mean. They come from a very wanting-to-save-the-world background

kind of thing, and so I think they're different. I mean, because Travis was, it's John Zimmer and Logan Green, the two of them, and they were the founders. And so it came out this thing called Zimride, which is a rideshare company that they founded in 2007, I think. And so it's a very different mentality. It's a very different company.

And John Zimmer and both of them are lovely, like the literally polar opposite of the original Uber people. At one point, I think it was John, it was at a party and I was sitting with a bunch of people and he goes, it was very early on in the stage of the company, and he starts going, you know what's really amazing? 80% of the cars are not in use and that's just wrong for the planet. Because one person sits in a car

and there's five seats or whatever. He's like, and 80% aren't in use. And we really just want to help the planet by filling those seats and this, on and on. And he really meant it. Like, it was really something. And he walked away and one of the CEOs there goes, Travis is going to kill him. Right. It was so funny.

Right, poor little cute thing. Oh, man. But they proved to be very aggressive and made some changes, I think, that are necessary there to be a little tougher and get away from this sort of softer side of ride sharing. And even in their headquarters, the last one they had that I was in, they had like soft, squishy things coming from the ceiling. And like it was super comfortable. And there was like a bro brewery. But it was nice. Ladies could go.

That kind of thing. And compared to the Uber headquarters, which looked like a Bond villain, like if you didn't put your feet on the sides of the elevator, the floor would drop out and you'd end up in a shark tank. So it was a very, very different people. I like them a lot. I'm telling you, I've said it before, Cara, but if you ever need a quick pick-me-up and you're feeling depressed, which for me is, I don't know, every 30 or 40 minutes, just roll up to a crowded place with a bunch of young people in your car, roll down the window and go, Uber, and see how many people instinctively just roll up to the side of your car. It is so much fun. That is a terrible thing, and I think terrible things have happened, but thank you for that. Please don't do that.

See who gets in back. Scott, I'm not going to bail you out of jail, let's just say. See who gets them back. Oh, you are definitely my second call. My first call is to a lawyer. By the way, I get, so now I'm boasting, I get calls from people who, I get calls from jail. I think it's because people think I'm discreet and I have access to cash and they're right on both. But I get, I'm the guy my friends call when they end up in jail.

So you should know that. You should have me on speed dial. Okay, good. I have to say something. Speaking of people calling you, I got so many people coming up to me at this event last night and all this week, how much they love you. I'd have to tell you. Go on. Sorry, I didn't hear that. Go on. What was that, Kara? What was that? I love that Scott Galloway. I've been calling him. We did a live podcast with Chuck Todd and others from Andrea Mitchell and Hallie Jackson from NBC News. And then last night we did Sam Altman. What's Chuck Todd like? He's from Miami, which really shocked me.

He's just like you'd imagine him to be. Really? Yeah. Go listen to the podcast. It's good. Andrea Mitchell is the hardest working person in journalism. And Hallie Jackson really throws it down. It was good.

It was fun. But Chuck's got a lot of opinions, and he's great. I like bantering with him. person in journalism and Allie Jackson really throws it down. It was good. It was fun. But Chuck's got a lot of opinions and he's great. I like bantering with him, but you had a lot of fans in DC, Scott. You have a lot of fans everywhere. Kara, where can we find the NBC podcast? You can listen to it on Recode Decode. There you go. All right. When we get back, we're going to take a quick break. And when we get back, we're going to talk about wins and fails of the week. Pivot is brought to you by our founding sponsor, Smartwater. So we both run businesses, manage day to day, and now host a podcast. I have a lot of podcasts. We're working hard and so does Smartwater. It's vapor distilled, whatever that is, for purity with electrolytes for

taste. It's water that keeps us hydrated as we work hard. And look, you work hard. You deserve a great tasting, hydrating water. Learn more at smartwater.com. We're here with Scott Galloway. This is Kara Swisher. This is Pivot. Scott, wins of this week?

Wins or fails? Well, I would go with a win. And I think that the legacy of George Herbert Walker Bush and taking some time and some pause to look at the patriotism, the service, the fidelity, the dignity, and I think more than anything, just the humility. I thought the kind of really interesting thing was, you know, he said he was very deliberate and he said, oh, no, we're inviting the president because it's the right thing to do and I don't want him to be miffed. And I thought, after all they've been through with this guy, you know, it just would have been so easy for them not to invite them. And the McCain funeral, while an incredible funeral, it felt like the majority of

that was sort of them having the last word. Whereas this was very much, I mean, here you have, okay, first off, George Bush, right? Youngest pilot in the history of the Navy. 18 years old, decides to get in a, I don't know, P-53 Thundercat, flies 58 combat missions, is shot down over the middle of the Pacific, somehow gets out of the plane, inflates a raft, and is sitting in the raft, and then probably comes to the realization that he's going to die of exposure. And then a submarine emerges. And then you got to hope, gee, I really hope that's one of our submarines. And the guy is pulled out of the water, you know, married for

70 years, Americans with Disabilities Act, Clean Air Act, managed to get these things done with both houses of Congress controlled by Democrats, passed more legislation than any president with the exception of FDR and Lyndon Johnson, but did it in four years. Just a reminder of some fantastic values that we aspire to in our leaders and also kind of a stark, also a disappointing reminder that a lot of those values seem to have slipped away. And so I thought it was very, very moving. Yeah, I wasn't a big fan of that whole era. I have to be honest with you, the whole Reagan.

I was at Georgetown at the time. And so I was more, you know, being just recently out, the whole AIDS thing was still disturbing. I know he did turn it around a little bit, but that whole, he was still part of the Reagan administration. Reagan never uttered the word in eight years. I know that. And I know you shouldn't be just an identity politics thing, but people were truly dying then,

and it was really appalling what was happening there. So that always tinged with that, with him. Also, some of his, you know, it's sort of like some of the mishaps, right? But you're right. Say more mishaps like some of the mishaps, right? So it's, but, but you're right. I mean, a lot of these people. Say more mishaps? What are the mishaps? Say more. Oh, just the way his verbal gaps. And it just, you know, it's sort of out of touchness of the elite. Again, it was sort of like, here we are ruled by our yell going leaders kind of thing. So I did, I did always enjoy Barbara Bushism. You know, that was one, she was one of my favorites and she just died also this year.

It's me missing saying they both died in the same, I think the same year. Um, but she was, I liked her thing cause she would pop off with something awful and I loved it. That was, that was my, I liked her a lot. Um, it's an impressive family. And if you hear, if you ever talk to people that know Jeb or speak to George W., I think W. will go down as probably the hard rock hall of fame of tragic or catastrophic geopolitical decisions. But people say he's actually a very decent man. Oh, this is a new thing.

They're decent, but they've ruined the world. I'm sorry. I'm not going to – People who work for Jeb love him. So this is – these are George you know, George and Barbara. I have met Jeb. He's a lovely guy. George and Barbara, you know, sort of their blink on the universe mattered.

They raised good, responsible children. And even though I think the marketplace, and I think this is right, has said we're not comfortable passing the mantle of the presidency between fathers and sons and husbands and wives, which I think is actually a good thing. Yeah. of the presidency between fathers and sons and husbands and wives, which I think is actually a good thing. This is an impressive family, and the patriarch passed away. I was just very moved by the whole thing. The image that will really stick with me, and it was on Twitter, was Bob Dole having someone, these guys lift him up and then him giving his salute to George. I thought that was really powerful.

Yeah. Again, I do have admiration for George W. Although it was to me like it was a quainter version of awful, like the conservative, the awful conservatism. It was a quainter, less dangerous version of what's happening now. In some ways, I kind of like to just see it out there and rapacious in the rapacious ways. In some ways, I kind of like to just see it out there and rapacious in the rapacious ways. And, for example, Trump today saying, you know, apparently he said in the Oval Office, I don't care about these deficits or whatever because I'm not going to be here. Right.

All presidents think like that. He just said it. And I'm sort of like, all right, you're an asshole. Thank you for confirming. You know, in a lot of ways, even though it's an awful sentiment, it's something that all of them behave like. Yeah, I don't know if anyone's told him, but his kids are probably going to be around for a while. By the way, strongest economy in a long time, and we're exploding the deficit. What passes for bipartisanship is reckless spending, right? Yeah. Republicans want tax cuts and military spending. Democrats want social programs. And

then occasionally we decide, I know, let's do it all and let's fuck future generations. It's literally like we're speaking to the future and saying, fuck you, I want mine, and I want it now. Speaking of saying dirty words. Too much? Too much? No, I like it. I like it. No, Michelle Obama disagreeing with Sheryl Sandberg on the lean-in.

That shit doesn't always work. Yeah. That was interesting. That was. And it was a new color for Michelle Obama, who tends to be always the diplomat. She is. I was thinking, when they go low, we go low.

Yeah. She's the one who said that. She's a super – what do you think? Do you think Michelle Obama, do you think she has a future in public service? Do you think anything? I don't think she's running. I think she likes being Michelle Obama. I think she likes – I think why would she do that?

Why would she subject herself to that? She can be influential. I think she's – the book is the most – I think she's, you know, the book is the most, I think it's the top seller of the year. People like her. The minute she enters politics, she gets slung. She's done. Yeah, I agree.

You know what I mean? Like, it all goes. It all moves off. And I don't, you know, I think she's perfectly competent to do it. It's not, like, it's not that. It's that she's, if you were her, like, is this what you want to spend the next 20 years of your life doing?

100%. Because it would be 20 years. Yeah. And, you know, she's already done it. She's already been there. I don't know. I don't know. She doesn't seem to want to do that.

Anyway, last thing, predictions, Scott? Predictions. So I think – oh, I have a couple. One, I think Ms. Sandberg will be gone within 12 months, but it'll be her idea. I think they're hoping this dies down

and I think she's going to announce that she wants to go run a foundation or talk about service. But I think she's done. I think she's gone. But it'll be her idea. I would disagree with you.

You think she's around in a year? Yes, I do. Okay, we'll bet. I was with some Facebook people last night. I don't think she's going anywhere. Really? Mark has to kill her. He's not going to kill her.

He's not going to throw her under the bus. It's not going to happen. Huh. And that's it. And my big prediction is, I talked about the AWS spin artists. Another prediction, I think that Amazon is going to start making the kind of the business story of 19 and innovation is the movement of big tech into health care. And if you look at industries and the kind of the disruption index in terms of what industries are most disruptible, that you just look at the price of the underlying service relative to inflation.

And with the reason Facebook and Google were so successful is the media industry kept raising its prices faster than viewership. And this disruption or this unearned margin of profitability, they stuck their chin out and Google and Facebook were there with kind of fists of stone. So you need this industry waiting to be disrupted that consumers don't like and it's fat margins and it's just charging too much. And there's nothing that is more disruptible right now than healthcare, which I think is now 18% of our economy. And I was asked, I got a call from a, I won't use his name, but an iconic kind of globally famous investor. And he said, which of these four do you think, and I'll turn the question to you, I'll give my answer, would be most successful moving into healthcare? And I said, well, the easy last place is Facebook. No one's going to tell

Facebook they have diabetes or an STD. Number three, I think, weirdly enough, is Google. Even though they're great with data, my sense of their healthcare initiatives, it's been kind of these moonshot CSR things, cure death. Yeah, they just don't want to die, Scott. That's really good. Yeah, there you go. I'll be so ready when that swings around, hopefully in 40 years. Anyway, that's probably... Yeah, that's not going to happen for you. You don't get to not die. Yeah. And then from what I understand, the mortality rate is still 100%. So, and then number two, I think is Apple. Most people would pick Apple's number one. I think the data they collect from all the wearables is inflated in terms of its importance and its

utility. And they don't have the core asset you'll need to be a player in healthcare, and that is their investors like profits. So the company that I think is going to go after healthcare and just scare the shit out of everybody when they start peeling off the most actuarially appealing households in America and insuring them, I think they're going to go through the insurance store, is Amazon because they know- I agree with you on this. I need with you on this. They know your body mass index based on the size of the clothes you order. They know the food, how healthy your diet is. They're pretty soon going to know the pharmaceuticals you're on. They're going to know if you're in a monogamous relationship.

They're going to know if you're wealthy. All the things that indicate you're in good or poor health. And what they'll do is they'll offer over Alexa. They'll say, hey, Prime member, would you be interested in exploring a way to cut your healthcare costs in half with Prime Plus insurance? And they will literally take the healthiest, most profitable, or least expensive households off the table, and we are going to freak out. Yeah. I think that's really – I think you're right. They could do almost anything.

I was just thinking the other day because I had another mishap with Home Depot and stuff that I tweeted about. And I literally could have gotten Amazon to deliver this. You were at Home Depot. Hold on. Home Depot and I had a disagreement. But they did handle it well in the end because I tweeted to all the people. Actually, lots of things went awry. But when I was doing it, I looked on Amazon. I could have gotten it in two days,

and I know it would have been delivered beautifully. And I thought, I didn't pick Amazon because I didn't want to give them every bit of my business. You know what I mean? I was like, I can't let them be fantastic again. Because there's so many stuff now coming out about the toll on these delivery people, the toll on the people who pack it. There's so much, you know, it's sort of like these, you know, I don't want to compare this to like the Harry Potter movie, but Dobby. You know what I mean? There's all these people working under the hood at these places

that are suffering in a way that we don't even think about. Well, nice Potter reference, but I have two questions. And the first is, first off, I want to ask her, as a point of personal privilege to give Home Depot another chance. They're an outstanding organization with a great management team. I think they're fantastic at what they do. And it's really nice to see a big retailer actually succeeding in the world of Amazon. So I think your instincts to go to Home Depot are really strong.

Well, I tried. They ended up breaking my garage, but I won't go into it. There you go. There you go. Karma, karma, karma, karma chameleon. So the last thing I will do that are you on the board of

Home Depot or something no but I like those guys a lot the golden aprons they're I know the guys in digital they're the CEOs like just

like an earnest you're always wandering around with drywall I'm sure right Scott that's your game I know I seriously

am the least handy person you've ever met it is this comes as zero surprise to Kara oh my gosh I know. I seriously am the least handy person you've ever met. This comes as zero surprise to Kara Swisher. Oh, my gosh. I'm very handy. I go into Home Depot, and seriously, I might as well be on the moon. I don't even know what's in there. I can't even recognize that stuff. People buy wood and lumber there. I'm like, where are they taking this stuff, and what are they doing? What are they doing with this wood? They buy drills, And I'm like, do you have to plug this thing in? What is this? I know what I'm getting you for Christmas.

It's going to be a tool belt. Where's the battery? I'm getting you a tool belt, Scott, for Christmas. That's the plan. I like it. A little tiny little hammer for you, a little screwdriver. It'll be nice to practice and wander around. Oh, wait, my question.

You brought up the poor treatment of Amazon workers and things that are coming out. My question is this. Do you think this is unique to Amazon? No. Or have we just been sort of— They're not as nice as they could be. They should be three times as nice, I think. You know, three times as fast forward.

Isn't it just coming to light that kind of minimum wage workers all across America get treated like shit? Yes. This is what my point was at the beginning is their businesses, they don't care. Yeah. They just don't. 100%. Speaking of predictions, we're going to play on the show of Recode Decode this week a tape of my son, Louis, and Casey Newton talking. I want you to comment on this. Predicting socializing will happen in private groups rather than on social media.

I have a hot take about social media. Okay, hot take. Yeah, so in 2019, I think 2019 is the return of the group chat. If you talk to people about the kind of social interactions they actually like, it's group text, whether it's on iMessage,

whether it's on your Snapchat, talking to a small group of friends, you know exactly who's there. You can share your in-jokes. You don't have to pose for people. You can just be dumb. There's none of this pressure. If you use an app like Snapchat, all of those chats can just disappear. They're not

going to haunt you forever. Or maybe you just use iMessage and it's end-to-end encrypted and you feel like you're probably going to be fine. But I think increasingly, more and more people are just going to want to group chat and not worry about the rest of everything that social media has to offer. What do you think, Mr. Swisher? I agree with that. Wow. So what do you think, Scott? What do you think about what Louis and Casey said? So anything your son says, I'm inclined to agree with. But yeah, I think what you have is, I think young people are actually more aware of the danger and kind of, I think it's drilled into them earlier and more often that your digital record goes on your permanent record. And if you want to have a conversation or you want to express anything a

little bit off color or more aggressive, it should be done in small groups. Now, but what, can you expand on what he meant by the socialization will take place in groups and not online? Well, this was Casey's idea, and I think Louis agreed with it, is that he was, he actually, Louis went even further. It was in a case he said that he thought that you wouldn't be in these larger groups, that you would be in these small group chats.

And it's more, you know, it's happening on a bunch of places like Instagram and other places. And Louis made the example, he was in a cube and he uses his Snapchat, which you can't use there. He was there over the holidays. And he started using the Instagram group chat thing. He was like, it was so uncool to use Instagram to talk to my friends, which was interesting.

But he was talking about the idea of being just in a... He likes Snapchat and the concepts around it. And so he said even more so. But then he went a step further and he said, well, you know what, I'm really interested in his analog, talking to people in person. And I was like, what a concept. So strange.

And so they definitely are a warier group. My other son is just starting to use, he texts a lot more, which is interesting. How old's your youngest? 13. He does. I mean, he knows how to use Snapchat and stuff. I'm pretty sure he's texting.

And he uses his video games to talk to his friends. Fortnite because all of his colleagues, all of his buddies play in their class. And I'm telling you that we gave the kid crack. No, really? Interesting. I don't know. My kid does really well in school. Oh, my gosh.

All weekend long, we'll be on the beach, beautiful day, boogie boarding, hanging out, running around with the dog. And he's like, can we go home now? Can we go home now? Oh, no. And it's because he's thinking about Fortnite. Well, it wears off. That's where my

kids were like that, and then it wears off. They don't stay at home. Yeah, I think this addictive quality has. I think it's a phase it'll grow out of in about 70, 75 years. No, stop it. No, my kids aren't using it as much. But they like it. They still like it, but they aren't using it as much. But it's interesting is a lot of what they like about it is the socializing,

I think, about the way they're doing it, not as much the games. And they like, actually, it was really interesting. I had a bunch of them, 13-year-olds over, and I was asking what they liked. And a lot of them liked the stories in them, like whatever they are, like the historical stuff and this and that. You know, every one of these things has a different story, and they actually enjoy.

They're playing you. They're like the French Revolution, one of them. They're playing you. The Assassin's Creed, I don't know. They're playing you. They're like, here, I like the historical stuff. Where can I go kill someone on screen? No, they do. They're playing you like, here, I like the historical stuff. Where can I go kill someone on a screen?

No, they do. I'm telling you, they do. They like the stories. They like the stories, which is these video games have gotten to be really interesting in terms of stories. I don't think it's the way

to learn history. I'd rather they read like historical tomes. It's all right. Do you bond with your kids over media? Do you play video games or watch TV with them?

No, I don't play video games. We bond over cooking. We bond over cooking and talking. Oh, that's nice. And debating. That's how we bond. And going out and wandering around. Anyway, this has been a great week.

Thank you for hosting. We will have all our kids on the show. Maybe we'll just do the show. That would be nice. Yeah, and that would be good. So next week, we'll have lots more to talk about. I think there's going to be Google coming to Congress, I think, next week. That's right.

There's going to be plenty for us to chew over. Anyway, Rebecca Sananas produces this show. Nishat Kerwa is Vox Media's executive producer of audio. Thanks also to Eric Johnson, who's sitting right across from me in my kitchen in San Francisco. Thanks for listening to Pivot from Vox Media. Join us next week for more of a breakdown on all things tech and business. If you like what you heard, please subscribe on Apple Podcasts or wherever you're listening. We're fans of our founding sponsor, Smart Water.

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