Pivot - Twitter and Facebook ban Trump, the future of Internet regulations under Democrats, and a prediction on Sheryl Sandberg
Episode Date: January 8, 2021Kara and guest hosts Casey Newton and Louie Swisher talk about the insurrection on the US Capitol and the de-platforming of Donald Trump. They also discuss the future of FCC, Section 230, and antitrus...t now that the Senate, House, and White House will all be blue. In predictions, Casey Newton says this will be Sheryl Sandberg's last year at Facebook. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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Hi, everyone.
This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network.
I'm Kara Swisher.
Scott is out this week.
So the family affair continues with my co-hosts, Louis Swisher and Casey Newton, the editor of Platformer,
a newsletter about big tech and democracy.
Obviously, Louis Swisher is my son,
who is fantastic. Hello, boys. Hello, Karen. Hey, Mom. Happy New Year. How you doing? Thank you.
Casey's in California. Louis is downstairs at my studio, my podcast studio here in Washington.
It's my second studio. So, there's so much to talk about, and we are going to talk about what happened in the Capitol.
How are you two doing at the end of 2020 into 2021?
Luis, tell me.
I mean, same day, different year.
It's been a pretty weird experience, and it feels like a lot more of the same, especially with what happened or transpired yesterday.
So we're going to get into that.
But how are you looking toward 2021? I mean, still with, with hope. It's still, I think a pretty promising year
considering everything that's happened over the past week, but we'll just have to wait and see.
So how has the fall been and, and, and going, you went to college and you went to NYU and you
completed a semester there. You also had a two week quarantine and everything else. So how would
you assess your first few months of college? Because there was a lot of controversy of people
going back to school, and you'll be going back to school in a couple weeks. Yes, I will be. It's
definitely not at all what you guys have made it seem like. It's a very, very weird year to be in
college, a very limiting year to be in college. And there's still a lot of silver lining to it.
My classes were still excellent.
I still really enjoyed what I was learning about.
I found it very intriguing and interesting.
But a lot of this social life of college
was almost shot in the gut.
And that sucked.
But I think it was manageable.
And I think as we moved through this pandemic,
things will get better. And, you know, it'll return to normal. But it was definitely a weird experience I've gone through. And something I'm glad is past me. Yeah, well, not yet, actually.
Well, we're almost there. We're almost there. We're almost there. So Casey, how are you doing
there in San Francisco, California pandemic has gotten worse. You're in place, is that right?
Yeah, I mean, I was gonna go down
and see my family for Christmas, cancel my plans,
spent the whole time here in the cottage.
And that was really bad and hard,
but it felt like the responsible thing to do.
And I had about, I don't know,
six hours worth of optimism
when the Democrats regained control of the Senate.
And then a coup happened.
That was six years ago.
Yeah, it feels that way.
So, you know, yesterday, I mean, I truly think it was a dark day in American history.
And I still think darker days could be ahead as long as Trump remains in office. So right now, my eye is just very much on what that man is going to do and whether he can be dislodged from the presidency,
preferably before January 20th. So that which is in 13 days, correct, 13 days.
Louis, we're going to get to the president in a second. But Casey, when you're feeling that way,
when you have this up and down thing, what are you doing to cope?
I mean, I do throw a lot of it into my work, right? Like the reason that I built the job
that I have is because I like engaging with these issues and I cover the tech industry.
And I think there are things that the tech industry can do to make life marginally better
for the rest of us. So, you know, I put a lot of it into there.
You know, but outside of that, I mean, one of the many tragedies of the pandemic is it has just taken away some of my old coping mechanisms. You know, I'm in an improv comedy troupe. We've been
meeting over Zoom for nine months now. Let me tell you, if you hate improv in real life, wait
till you have it happening over Zoom. It is not any better, okay? Is it funnier? No, it's much worse. There's
so much lag. None of the jokes land. It's miserable. And that was one of the main things that I would
do to sort of decompress. And of course, you can't travel. It's harder to see your friends.
The one nice thing is that here at the house, we now have a roof deck with great furniture. And so
I'll have a friend over and we'll sit up on the roof and we'll, you know, have a drink or a glass of wine. And, you know, that has sort of been getting me through. But it's just really shocking how few things it feels like we really have that we're able to do safely just to maintain some sort of social connection to the world around us right now.
Louis, how do you deal with that? Maybe I don't want to know.
want to know. Yeah. I mean, there's, there's some ways I could get into, but or I won't,
but definitely I totally agree with what Casey just said. The usual means of like, you know,
feeling better, like seeing good friends, spending time with loved ones is it's a, it's,
it's almost impossible to nowadays without some sort of risk or, you know, fear on the mind.
So I think it's, you know, it's, it's, it's the year that's made us all stronger and more resilient. And, you know, I find myself like, you know, it's a year that's made us all stronger and more resilient.
And, you know, I find myself like, you know, as everyone does struggling with 2020 and its continuation.
It's, you know, most terrible sequel 2021.
So, I think, you know, it's a really hard year.
But I think there's, you know, there's still some, I found spending a lot of time with the family has been a benefit.
I really enjoy your guys' company.
You're just saying that, Lou.
Maybe I am, maybe I'm not.
Maybe you're not.
Who knows with you anymore?
All right, we're going to move on to the big story because there is only one story right now.
So, okay, big stories obviously is the insurrection on the U.S. Capitol this week.
I can't believe I'm saying that. Let's
talk about the platform's response to the coup and Trump's reactions. Facebook removed Trump's
video response to the mob, wherein he said the rioters were loved and special and he was cheated
and he understood. And by the way, go home. That was sort of what he was supposed to be doing,
but he did very little of that, lied quite a bit in the video. Twitter, which he does all the time, by the way.
He did it all day yesterday.
He's done it for the past months since the election.
Twitter ultimately removed several of Trump's tweets
and locked him out of his platform for 12 hours.
He probably could be back on very soon, possibly longer,
if he does not remove the tweets.
So let's start with Casey.
Casey, you can reflect on this in a second,
because we're going to also talk about the organization.
I also want to talk about the organization on platforms.
But let's talk about the actions of not just Twitter, but it's YouTube and Facebook.
So all three of them removed the video that Trump posted in which he less than half-heartedly tried to encourage his mob to leave the Capitol. Facebook put out a
statement saying they thought that on balance, it was likelier to lead to more violence than not.
YouTube actually removed it first. Twitter had labeled it and then eventually removed it.
And then a few hours later, both Facebook and YouTube issued temporary suspensions for Twitter. It was 12 hours after
Trump deleted his tweets. And for Facebook, it was a full 24-hour ban. YouTube still has yet to act.
I don't think this is enough. I argued in my column yesterday that now is the time to finally
deplatform Trump. But these steps that they've taken,
I think have made it likelier than ever before
than that they actually will.
That they will do that.
So why this 12,
explain the thinking inside these companies
because they each did different things.
They each did, and they're confusing.
They've been confusing for months
about the different things they do here.
Just lay them out very quickly for Louie and I.
And then I'd love, Louie, your response of how you feel about the deplatforming.
Go ahead.
Yeah, so social networks are built to get posts up, right?
Social networks work when they have as many people as possible on them and posting.
And if you make a mistake, they want to get you back up and running as soon as you can
so that you can get on there and you can post and share and engage and see ads and click on ads and buy things, right?
That's how these things are built. And so when they're designing policies like this,
they don't come at it from the perspective of like, what are the ways that we can ban our users,
right? It's always about what are the penalties that we can assess. And all of those penalties
are oriented around
getting users back on the platform.
So you look at what Twitter did,
and, you know, that makes sense
if you're talking about somebody who,
I don't know, you know, you actually,
I could call Louie, like, a really mean name on Twitter,
and, like, my account wouldn't be suspended.
But, you know, maybe I could, like, threaten him in some way.
And, you know, Twitter, instead of banning me forever,
would say, all right, Casey, take 12 hours off,
like, get a cooler head, and then you can come back to the platform. The problem is they're now trying to apply the same logic to a would-be autocrat who's staging a coup against his own government. And so that's where I just think a lie needs to be drawn.
this? What do you, and I, Casey, I do want to, because you and I have argued, I've thought he should be de-platformed. You have been on the other side of that for a lot. Louis, what do
you think about this as someone who watches this? Well, I totally agree with Casey there. I think
these tech companies are way too forgiving and they're always trying to invite users onto their
platforms. And it seems they don't really have a way to keep these leaders and the things they say, like, you know, hold them accountable for the things they say.
So I think he totally should have been kicked off a while ago.
I guess I thought the presidency gave him some sort of protection on Twitter, but I guess it doesn't.
And, you know, it's a private company.
Jack should kick him off whenever he pleases, whenever he feels like it.
And I think, you know, it should have been months ago, but no time like the present.
Yeah.
So are you offended by, you know, they argue,
conservatives argue that they've been discriminated against
to no proof that this has happened,
but to me they violate it more.
That's BS.
That's BS.
They violate it more.
They've been giving a platform more than anything.
They've been overheard.
So do you feel that the president should be given
a special consideration or not?
Well, like, no, no, he still has his First Amendment rights to be, you know, to be to speak freely and to be, I guess, to be heard doesn't have to be listened to.
But like you can't shout fire in a theater, you know, and he is he just called for a coup almost.
Yeah.
You know, without without doing it necessarily, he called for a coup and invasion of the Capitol.
So I think, you know, he needs to be, he called for a coup and an invasion of the Capitol. So I think, you know,
he needs to be held accountable
for his words
and what he incentivizes.
How is that different from,
I mean, I'm going to press you here,
than Cable.
I can't believe I'm on this side.
I think he should be
deplatformed completely.
But the,
they're not saying it on television
or somewhere else
or saying those things.
Because he's the president
of the United States
and people will listen to him.
Because he doesn't get edited there.
On TV, they can say that is not true.
He shouldn't do that.
They can add things in.
And on Twitter, they don't do that or Facebook.
Yeah, he needs to be held accountable.
Do you pay attention to him on Twitter at all?
You know, I think the best way to deal with Trump
going forward should be to ignore him.
But apparently we can't leave him
like alone. So yeah, after the events. So Casey, you have shifted on this. You and I, I have thought
he should be the platform for a while. And I got a lot of flack from the First Amendment crowd
because I was like, this is private company. This is not a public square. They can do whatever they
want, even though it's capricious. That's the problem I have with them. What shifted your
brain? That there were people taking selfies in Nancy Pelosi's office or what?
Well, I've always agreed that they could do it
if they wanted.
I thought that one,
it would just not be very practically effective
because you know what would happen
is that Trump would decamp to some other platform
or he would just post to the official White House website
and somebody would write a bot.
Actually, a lot of people would.
They would instantly repost everything the president said there to Twitter.
One of those accounts would grow up and be really large. And you could say, well,
the platforms could ban those too. But I just think when you're talking about the president
of the United States and you have a person who often is talking about the official business that
he's conducting on behalf of the people you just want to have a
balance that tilts toward letting that person continue to talk even if you think you know as
i do that he is the worst person in the world i think what changed is he now has no legitimate
claim on power he has no legitimate claim to that office he encouraged an attack on his own
government yesterday and if if Twitter and Facebook want
to continue to exist in a democracy, it is in their interest to remove someone who is using
that platform as a weapon to undermine the democracy that we all depend on.
So I just think that yesterday, a Rubicon was crossed. I understand the arguments to ban him
earlier. And my mentions are full of people saying, oh, well, you know, now you say it. But frankly, I think that there is power in some cohort of us holding
back, not calling for an immediate ban. And then when the bright line does finally get crossed,
people like me and Ben Thompson come along and say, enough is enough. And, you know, my hope is
that it will have some influence inside of the walls of those platforms. So how does that manifest itself?
What do you think?
How does that occur?
And do you think they'll do it?
Do you have any insight into the leadership of these companies?
I do.
Twitter put out a multi-thread statement
that basically said Trump is on his last warning.
I'm working on some reporting.
This time.
It's like when Louis was a kid.
If you do this one more time!
Yeah, but I mean, look, like,
I, you know, last time
this came up, or one of the last times, was when
Trump basically threatened nuclear war.
You know, like, I think it was against
Iran. He's also said, you know, very scary things
about North Korea. And I understand.
Some people look at it as, like, this is crazy. Like, this man is using
this platform to threaten nuclear war. Like, obviously
get rid of him.
But at the same time, this is an official communication from the president of the United States. We all hate that he's threatening nuclear war. But if he's going to do it,
shouldn't we know? Shouldn't we have that discussion? And I've leaned on that side.
But we're just in a different ballgame now. Joe Biden has been certified as the president-elect
of the United States. Trump is a lame duck. He is soon to be a
private citizen. And so he should just no longer be afforded the protections that were given to
the president of the United States. And I think that that's actually a huge difference.
Okay. And Louis, when you think about where he can go, where he could go, how should,
there's a site I just did an interview this morning with john mates of a parlay parlor parlor used to be
called parlay and the the things that are considered tweets on parlor are called parlays
um which is confusing uh he's he's probably going to go over there to other sites should he
should there be a fully free speech platform
i mean doesn't like 8chan exist?
Yeah.
4chan?
Yeah.
Like, I think that there already are places for that.
So I think, yes, I think people have the right to, you know, say what they want, but I don't
think they have the right to be free of the consequences of what they say.
There's always, you know, even if you threaten someone, there should be consequences.
If you speak ill of someone, you may have to speak to that person or something.
But I think there's always going to be a slot on Fox News for Donald Trump.
So I think he'll find places to go, whether it's Fox, OAN, Breitbart, other platforms who will hear what he has to say, regardless of if he's banned from Twitter, but I think being on mainstream platforms and holding a mainstream, you know,
standing on a box in the public square
and, you know,
like a respected box,
you know,
it gives him an elevated voice
that I think he no longer deserves.
Yeah, perfect.
The mainstream.
I think you're right about the mainstream thing.
All right, let's get to the idea of,
do you think he's going over to Parler, Casey?
He's got to go back to the fringes.
I do. And you know why? Because we got to go back to the fringes. I do.
And you know why?
Because we got some breaking news.
This is happening as we're recording.
Mark Zuckerberg just posted and said that they are going to restrict Trump's access to his account indefinitely and at least through the next two weeks.
So he is not going to have access to Facebook.
So that's the right thing to do.
And as a result, I would expect the president to find
another home. You know, often what will happen is that one platform will make a move like this,
and the rest of them look, sort of look around and say, you know what, like, if we're ever going
to do it, it's now and they all kind of jump together. I like I wouldn't be surprised if,
you know, by the end of today, Twitter makes a similar move.
Yeah, that's I'm guessing they should, which is what I called for just recently.
So talk a little bit about the posting on social media of this stuff.
Louis, you were watching a lot of these things yesterday, these pictures of them doing selfies
and stuff like that.
One of the things that occurred to me was that they put their pictures out there.
They're actually actively putting out their pictures.
And so it's easy for the FBI to
track them. Yeah, well, they think they're patriots saving the United States of America
from an election that was stolen. They literally believe the narrative that they're trying to
uphold and the narrative that they're fighting for. So I think if you were trying to save America,
you would post a selfie too. But they're just incriminating themselves. They're proving that
they were there.
I mean, it's like I said, like I said, when we were talking before this podcast, if there's any time to wear a mask, it's when you're storming the Capitol.
So.
But they can't spread COVID, Louis.
I mean, more for anonymity, but like more for anonymity.
But like, I mean, it's just I think they're just totally incriminating themselves. And I think they're proud of their actions.
It's just, I think they're just totally incriminating themselves.
And I think they're proud of their actions.
And I think that totally debunks some of these Antifa theories about who really raided the Capitol, which are ridiculous.
But I think, you know, yeah, I think they're very proud of their actions, it seems, and they should be held responsible for their actions.
All right, Casey, what about you?
What do you think about this?
How they're using social media, all the MAGA people are using it? Because they use it actively.
They're on Parler.
They're on all kinds of,
they're all on Instagram.
They're Instagramming this stuff.
It felt like, I was like,
literally, it's a reality show.
It was Duck Dynasty.
It was the guy with the Viking hat
or wherever the hell that guy is.
He's a very scary right-wing fella.
I think he's the QAnon shaman
or something like that.
QAnon, the QAnon guy, yeah.
Yeah, I mean, I accept
as part of living in a democracy, I mean, to be
surrounded by hundreds of millions
of people who disagree with me about all
sorts of things, right? And wear weird clothes.
We do live in the Castro. You and I live in the Castro.
Hey, sometimes in the Castro, they don't
wear clothes at all.
But, you know,
so I don't tend to think of this in terms of like, oh,
MAGA is using social media, that's a problem. What I see the problem is, is realities are
splintering. You look around the last couple of weeks, you have this pharmacist in Wisconsin who
decides that vaccines are hurting people, so he sabotages 500 doses. You have in the United
Kingdom, people are hanging up the Magna Carta in the windows
because they think it allows them to reopen their shops because they saw it in a viral
Facebook post.
You saw the Nashville bomber who is under investigation for maybe believing that a lot
of Democrats are like extraterrestrials and lizard people.
And it's just become clear to me that this is not a problem that you can solve
by removing individual pieces of information, which is what the platforms have tried to do
up until now. You actually need to promote high quality news. You need to create a shared sense
of reality. And, you know, I could talk about ways that I think the platforms can do it, but
ultimately, like that, I think is the issue that we need to address, you know, more than like, well, you know, some Republicans are doing stupid posts.
So, so, Louie, when you think about this, about using social media, you're,
you're sort of a medium user. How, tell me how you use it right now, how you think about that?
Like, I, I, I'm glad you didn't go to Congress and take a selfie. And I didn't, I'm glad you
didn't steal the podium and then do thumbs up.
That picture, I was like,
your entire face stealing and thumbs up.
Like, hey.
And an adult.
It wasn't also an adult who did it.
But go ahead.
How do you look at that?
I wouldn't really want to hang around that crowd.
But I think that, you know,
I use social media pretty, you know,
as much, it's gone up definitely.
My usage has definitely gone up during the pandemic and the, you know, the restricted lifestyle that, you know, create, that it creates.
But I've been trying to move away from more of like the social media apps and more towards like, you know, the social aspect of it and more towards like the, I don't know, like the news aspect of it.
I'm trying to like, I don't really know. I'm trying to convey it, but like I look at Twitter for news more
rather than like memes. But you've evolved. Talk about your evolving. Cause you use Snapchat still,
correct? Yeah, I do. I do. It's still a pretty good way of talking to people. I think from now
on I'll be asking for numbers, not Snapchats. Forget the Snapchatting business. So when you do that, when you think
about like Instagram, when you think about TikTok, you don't do TikTok at all. Is that correct?
Yeah, I had TikTok, but then I got rid of it. I wasn't really feeling it.
You said you just, you got rid of it. Why?
I just wasn't really feeling it. I didn't really enjoy the, I mean, I used it a lot.
They definitely got my attention for a while, but-
You were talking about the dancing.
You didn't like all the dancing.
Yeah, I just found myself just laying in bed,
just scrolling on TikToks for hours and hours and hours.
And I was like, wow, I need to delete this app.
But now I do it with YouTube, so it's a little better.
Yeah, you've consistently used YouTube.
I love YouTube.
So Casey, what is going to happen with this idea
of these companies also posting illegal pictures?
These guys are stealing.
It's all fun and games until you steal Nancy Pelosi's podium.
Yeah, I mean, there's been this really interesting debate about that over the past couple of years
because people will use social media to post like war crimes, for example,
or they'll post like stolen antiquities.
And the platforms will come along and say, well, this is a crime
and you're not allowed to post evidence of crime
on our networks.
And so then they'll delete it.
And then the activists come along and says,
you're deleting evidence of war crimes.
And like you're deleting part of the historical record.
And so there's this debate
about what platforms should do in this case.
And I think, you know,
the answer is that instead of deleting the content,
it probably doesn't need to be removed
from the service in a lot of cases.
They were doing that with a lot of the people
in Bait in the Capitol. They were taking down
their videos. But keeping up the journalists ones of the same thing from the other side,
which was interesting. There's a great organization called Bellingcat, which has a lot of
sort of like investigations into wrongdoing using social media as part of their investigations.
And yesterday they put out a call and they said, if you see any video anywhere from the Capitol,
please save them and submit them to us
because we want to build a historical record
of everything that's going on.
I'm sure some of it will be shared with law enforcement.
But so you're now seeing these like community projects
that are trying to save this.
So the revolution will be televised.
Revolution.
And archived and live streamed and all of it.
By the way, MAGA people, it's not a revolution.
It's just gross.
It's what it is.
And then lastly, when you think about this idea of keeping every bit of things in a record,
Louis, how do you feel about that?
Because your whole life, you and I have had long discussions.
I'm a bit too much of a Sharon.
Your brother never lets me put anything up.
And he's very-
He's on lockdown.
You're not going to get his image.
You know, he's like,
it's easier to find images of the Sacklers
than it is to find images of Alex Swisher.
You know, like one time,
I remember very vividly,
one time we were in Chicago
and we were at an Apple event
and some Apple reporter or photographer
snagged a picture of him.
He was up on the website,
like coincidentally,
and he had it shut down within minutes.
Yeah, he did.
He was like,
God damn it, that's my image.
He made me call like Tim Cook
and take it down.
Yeah, like I said,
easier to find images of Richard Sackler
than Alex Swisher.
All right, Casey and Louie,
let's go on a quick break.
When we come back,
we'll talk about another big news story
of the week,
the Senate flipping blue
and what it means for the future
of internet week. It's the sound of flipping blue and what it means for the future of Internet regulations.
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Okay, we're back. Georgia voted in Senators Raphael Warnick and John Ossoff to be in the
Senate, both Democrats. That means the House, the Senate, and the White House will all be blue.
What will it mean for the future of the FCC and the future of the internet? Now, I know,
Louie, you're not an expert, but you have thoughts on tech regulation. You know, I talk about it
consistently and constantly. I know it's riveting to you. But I'm going to start
with Casey on this one. Casey, what happens to all these things? Net neutrality, the attacks on
TikTok, Amazon at the post office, Section 230. It's like everything. Already things that Bill
Barr had started in the Justice Department against Google and in the FTC against Facebook. Yeah, I mean, I think the number one thing is you will just see these questions
begin to be answered in a calmer, slower democratic process and not be decided by the whims of a madman,
right? And that's like, we sort of just take for granted that that's like our way of life now,
but it's not going to be next month and
I can't wait. But it is going to have some practical consequences. I think one of the
big ones is there was an assumption that the Republicans would maintain control of the Senate.
And so Biden would have to compromise on his FCC appointees in particular and would not be allowed
to appoint anyone who believed in that neutrality. That's not true anymore. So Biden has a real opportunity to get in there and appoint people who believe
in net neutrality. And so this could have actually saved net neutrality for the rest of us.
Saved net neutrality. All right. What else? What else? What are they going to do? Because I think
Biden doesn't know a whole lot. You know, every time he talks about 230, I get a little bit like,
no, he doesn't. It's really it's like one of the things about him that I find the most disappointing is he just doesn't have a sophisticated understanding at all.
I mean, I'm sure there are some laws.
He has a good understanding.
Wait, wait.
Does your grandpa like, come on, understand how to work?
He's dead for your information, Louie.
Oh, wow.
Oh, I'm sorry.
Wow.
Too soon.
Too soon.
It's okay.
But yeah,
he doesn't have a good understanding of that.
And,
but okay.
But,
but at the same time he has said like ban it and repeal it.
So,
and,
and he doesn't like use that kind of talk lightly or about a lot of
things.
And so I,
I'm inclined to believe he's at least somewhat serious.
So it does seem like 230 reform. Talked about it. I think she has, lightly or about a lot of things. And so I am inclined to believe he's at least somewhat serious.
So it does seem like 230 reform is coming. Well, Nancy Pelosi has talked about it. I think she is more up to speed. And some others have different thoughts. There are a lot of very,
let me disabuse, there's a lot of very intelligent politicians on these issues, by the way,
on both sides of the aisle. Incredibly, there's a lot of really smart people who do understand this
and they regulate everything else. So there's no reason why they can't regulate this. So if you had to stack rank, what is going to be looked at? Obviously, the continuing
investigation, Justice Department investigations, the FTC investigations into Facebook, Google,
where, what do you see the big part? Is it going to be antitrust? Is it going to be a privacy law?
Is it going to be Section 230? Is Josh, I think Josh Hawley is finished in many ways. Oh, I hope so.
And he certainly can't be the leader on this 230 thing,
which he was relatively pushing it really hard.
But what do you think? Pick one.
I think antitrust, because both Republicans and Democrats
share the belief that these companies are too big
and they want to see them broken up.
Right.
I actually think we will see more antitrust. There is a lot of momentum behind an
Amazon antitrust suit, and there's a lot of good reason to pursue an Apple antitrust suit. So I
wouldn't be surprised if by the end of the year, both of those weren't facing antitrust regulations
of their own. And you think Merrick Garland is, would, is, will back these?
It'll take the backing of those. If I know Merrick Garland, Kara, which I don't. I do. I do. I sat
next to him at dinner. What's he really like? He's lovely. He's lovely. I just had literally,
this is a dinner party in Washington that I went to, which I'm going to drop some names here,
but on one side was Merrick Garland and the other side was Elena Kagan.
Oh my gosh.
It was like Supreme Court justice and the one who didn't get it. And it was so,
so of course, what did I do? That sucked, huh? That's what I said to Merrick Garland.
You know, and I bet he loved it. He was like, get a load of this firecracker over here.
Well, he was super sweet. He's very nice. He's really calm. But his wife was like,
yeah, that sucked. Like, you know what I mean?
It was interesting.
It was an interesting thing.
But in any case, that's DC.
So, Louis, when you think about regulating, you're not an expert in this, obviously.
But when you think about big tech, are they?
Well, you're not.
What do you think about the power of big tech and the power of big companies?
Are you worried that, you know, I think I've drilled it into you that we shouldn't have nests in our house, this and that, like the idea. Yeah, we do. We totally have a nest in our house.
We have a thermostat, but it's all the things are turned off. So it can't really
spy on us too much. And again, your brother went around and unplugged all the cameras
and everything else that happened to be in the house. But how do you feel about the power of
big tech? I think big tech is way too much power. And I think with this change in political control,
characters like Elizabeth Warren
are going to have a field day on the tech industry,
which I'm really excited to see happen.
I think they've long gone too unregulated.
They're just like the big oil companies
of the past centuries.
And I think that it's time that they got regulated.
It's time that the employees became more respected in the companies rather than like the shareholders. And like that the, you know, I just think it's time for change. And I think this is the time for it.
You use Amazon a lot. That's the one you interface with.
No, I actually don't. I don't really like Amazon. I actually like going to the store.
Oh, wow.
I think that's pretty exciting.
Yeah.
I think Amazon's great. Amazon has a, i've definitely used amazon a lot in the past um but do you think about it because a lot
of people feel like a lot of younger people do make choices on what they buy it and where they
buy it yeah i mean if i i always prefer to go to like a brick and mortar establishment i find it
more exciting than just sitting behind my computer and clicking away. And also I find I buy less than like if I'm just sitting behind the computer. All right. But I think I'm always aware of what
I'm doing. I think a lot of younger people are too, but I also think a lot of people are very
unaware of the implications of their like, you know, decisions on the internet and which companies
they interact with. Yeah. Do you, would you be able to stack rank them yourself? Which ones do you think are better or worse? I'll give you five.
Apple, Netflix, Google, Google slash Alphabet, Facebook, and Twitter.
Wait, well, better is very subjective.
What do you mean by that?
Which one do you feel has your interests at heart?
When you think of the brands that you like.
Probably Apple.
I feel like I trust Apple the most out of all those companies to have my interest at heart.
I think I just got a new phone
and their terms of service.
I actually looked through the terms of service
for the first time.
Oh, wow.
And it was a little,
I didn't read the whole thing, of course,
but I found it a little more,
I felt a little more comforted by Apple
than any of these other companies.
Some of them scare me,
like Amazon definitely scares me.
And what about a Netflix? When it knows what you watch, you watch a lot of Netflix. more comforted by Apple than any of these other companies. Some of them scare me. Like Amazon definitely scares me.
And what about a Netflix?
When it knows what you watch, you watch a lot of Netflix.
Yeah, I like, I'm more of an HBO Max kind of guy, but I like, I do like Netflix.
I've watched a lot of great shows.
I'm, you know, like they've taken off some ones that I like,
which I'm upset about, but.
Let me ask that, this is off topic,
but you're an HBO Max kind of guy.
Why is that compared to, all these streaming services, how do you look at it? Because you but you're an HBO Max kind of guy. Why is that?
Compared to all these streaming services,
how do you look at it?
Because you use them all.
You use all of them.
Yeah, but it's just like,
HBO Max has better shows.
Do you watch anything in a linear way?
No, you don't.
You just watch everything on demand, correct?
What is the linear way?
What is that?
What is the linear way?
Like it comes on and you watch it.
Like on the cable box.
On the cable box.
Oh, yeah.
I used to when I was younger,
but now we have all these cool technologies,
so I don't have to.
Yeah, so what do you use?
YouTube?
Yeah, I use YouTube way too much.
I love YouTube.
It's good for my short attention span,
and it has a lot of interesting content.
I try to watch more informative content
than stupid content,
but I find I enjoy both.
Can I ask you a question?
When this idea,
I wrote recently about Warner Brothers putting all the movies on and Casey has
written about this too.
Warner brothers putting all the movies on streaming services so that you watch
them at home. I watched Wonder Woman in 84, for example,
but they put all 17 movies on there's 17 of their movies on the slate on,
on their new HBO service. Max. Do you care about movie theaters?
Or would you rather just watch them when you want to?
Well, I... Was that for Casey?
No, for you.
And then Casey.
Well, I've been a longstanding believer
in watching movies at home over the movie theaters
since I was little.
Like, I can pause it when I want.
I can bring the food that I want.
You know, I think it's...
You can turn your home into a movie theater,
which is pretty exciting. But there is always this, like, you know, there's a joy of
going to the movie theater that can't really be replaced. So I think those will definitely still
stick around, but I much prefer watching movies at home than the, than the theater.
What about you, Casey Newton? Using up my internet there in San Francisco.
My hope is that this is the crisis that leads movie theaters to reinvent
themselves,
you know,
and we,
we already have some great movie theaters here in San Francisco.
I love our Alamo draft house.
Sure.
You know,
pretty much.
And Barcadero is okay.
The Kabuki is nice too,
right?
You can,
you can,
you can order a drink,
right?
The food is maybe one cut above what you would find like at an AMC.
You know,
when Louis was a kid,
I went,
we got movie tickets
and they wouldn't let us in
because we had to go through the bar
to get there once.
We had to walk through the bar.
Remember that?
Oh, wow.
That was a great crisis
of the Swisher family.
Yeah.
But yeah, like I think,
you know, I remember,
you know, before the pandemic,
Alamo was starting to experiment
with like a monthly pass.
And I think it was, you know,
30 bucks a month and you could see like two three movies. Movie pass sort of came and went,
but I think got a lot of people excited about the idea of what a smarter movie theater could do.
So I still think there's a lot of opportunity there because at the end of the day, people need
to go on dates. People need to do things with their kids. People love to leave the house. And
I think they will be happy to do so again, but the movie theaters are going to need to do things with their kids, right? Like, people love to leave the house, and I think they will be happy to do so again,
but the movie theaters are gonna need to meet them halfway.
And, you know, to your Wonder Woman point,
I watched that movie on Christmas.
Terrible, by the way, really sad.
But it's a movie that, after I read the reviews,
I wouldn't have gone to see it in the theater,
but I was happy to pay HBO 15 bucks
to have something to do on Christmas. So I Yeah. But I was happy to pay HBO 15 bucks
to have something to do on Christmas.
So I think there's a way where like everyone can win here.
All right.
What are you watching?
What's your big show?
Yours is The Wire.
Louie is sort of retro.
What is yours, Casey?
I've spent quarantine.
I've watched 30 seasons of Survivor.
Oh my God.
There is something in this time watching,
like it's such a hard time.
The way I feel better about myself. I watch... I'm going to regulate Casey.
That's what needs to happen.
That's too much survivor Casey.
It definitely is.
I also just got Masterclass, so now I'm
watching Gordon Ramsay is teaching me how to cook.
I've seen the ads for that. The ads got
me. That show looks great.
It's fun. I like it.
I do have a hot take, though, on this.
I think
2020
and the pandemic
and everything
hot take
like it will be
the rebirth
of the drive-in movie
I think
I think that is
going to be reinvented
I went to some
this summer
it was really great
it was
I think
that's going to be
a big comeback
and is that just
because teens love
making out
in drive-in movies I mean that's one that's one reason but I think comeback. And is that just because teens love making out in drive-in movies?
I mean, that's one reason.
But I think they're really nice.
They're really charming, especially when everyone's there,
everyone's distanced, but everyone's safe
and everyone's having a good time.
And it's almost like a semblance of normalcy,
which I think is really, really something
that everyone's searching for.
Yeah, that's a flash in the pan.
People will go right back to not going to drive-ins.
Hey, if there's a drive-in movie, I'd love to go.
All right.
Okay.
We'll get you one.
And then, so I was going to ask you, what is your prediction, Louis?
Is that your prediction that we drive in movies?
That's not a prediction.
I want Casey and Louis, both of you.
First of all, what is the show you want?
You watch The Wired is the next one you're going to watch, right?
That's my next adventure.
Yeah.
Your next adventure.
Okay.
On that note.
All right, Casey and Louis, one more quick break and we'll be back for predictions.
Okay. On that note, all right, Casey and Louis, one more quick break and we'll be back for predictions. and the finances, marketing is the last thing on your mind. But if customers don't know about you,
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Okay, Casey and Louie, usually Scott is the prediction machine,
but tell me one thing you expect to see in the days, weeks, or months ahead.
Casey, you go first.
All right.
Because age before beauty.
No, beauty before.
Beauty and age last.
Okay.
I'm an honorary member of Gen Z.
My hot prediction is that Sheryl Sandberg will not be at Facebook by the end of the year.
My hot prediction is that Sheryl Sandberg will not be at Facebook by the end of the year.
I think assuming that Trump is dislodged from the presidency, Democrats retake control of everything, start to pass some pro-democracy legislation, she will not have a better
opportunity in the next four years than she has this year, maybe next year, to kind of gracefully
step away. She'll be able to say, look, we had a lot
of problems. I fixed as many of them as I could. This is a natural stepping away point for me. So
I say Cheryl's days are now numbered. Oh, wow. And what is the real behind the
scenes situation, Casey Newton? You know, I mean, I haven't heard a lot of whispering,
but the question I'm always asking people at Facebook is like, what does Cheryl like about
her job? Like she has nothing left to prove.
She has nothing but hard problems ahead of her. Is she influential?
Is she still as influential?
I think,
I think that she's extremely influential.
I think,
you know,
Mark,
Mark takes her counsel very seriously,
but she's been doing that job a long time and no part of that job has been
done for years.
I think Mark takes his own counsel.
I think he doesn't.
I think he was relying on her a lot more
and less so,
and that's the problem.
Well, you know,
people have a lot
of criticism of her, too.
But that's a very good prediction.
When?
When?
When?
When?
I'm just kidding.
I would say, like,
by the end of the year
is sort of what it feels
like to me.
I think it'll depend.
I mean, first of all,
the Democrats have to
actually assume power.
Like, they've won,
but as we've seen
over the past few days.
She's now not getting a job in this administration. I don't think she wants one. Like, I think it'll depend. I mean, first of all, the Democrats have to actually assume power. Like, they've won, but as we've seen over the past few days.
She's now not getting a job in this administration.
I don't think she wants one.
Like, I think she'll do something
that's like sort of either in the nonprofit realm
or the venture realm,
at least for a little bit.
Like, maybe she'll come back to politics later.
I mean, you know,
she's an incredibly talented business leader.
Like, she can do a million different things.
So you think she can revive the career?
Because she's really been tarnished. I know
in D.C., they're like, no way.
You know, and she would have been
number one on the list of
commerce, labor, this and
that. I think that's what, there has to be
like an intermediate step, which, you know,
might make a non-profit
thing more likely. But I could also just see her like doing
something like that, you know, for the next
long stretch of her career.
Yeah, and she's still young.
She's still very young. We'll see if she takes over another
thing, but I think a lot of people definitely
have a lot of criticism of her, and
a lot of it is aimed at her over Mark, which
as you know, I have argued that Mark
deserves much of the credit
and the detraction.
Louis, prediction?
I think my prediction for 2021, or maybe the coming month, coming year, is that it's going
to be a year of progress.
It may not be.
I think now that the Senate has flipped blue, it's going to be a bit more progress than
it would have been.
But I think it will be incremental and steady progress towards a greater America based off
the fact that there's a return to a sense of normalcy, a step away from the chaotic, the chaos of the Trump era
and the Trump administration.
I think, you know, call me young and naive, but I think we have, okay, but I think we
have politicians who will actually now listen to us.
And if there's going to be real change, I think it's going to happen now.
You sound like a politician. I think the first thing they should do is fix the election or else nothing's going to happen. Do you there's going to be real change, I think it's going to happen now. You sound like a politician.
I think the first thing they should do is fix the election or else nothing's going to happen.
Do you want to run for office?
Maybe. I don't know. There's a lot of things I want to do in my life, but we will see. We will
see. I have hopefully a lot of life ahead of me.
Yeah. Do you know what you used to say when you were in restaurants? You don't remember when you
were a kid. I'm going to now embarrass you.
Louis used to go up to people.
He was very friendly to people.
He used to go up to people and go,
hi, Louis Swisher,
I'd like your vote for presidency, please.
And walk away.
He would stay.
Yeah.
And if Louis had been elected president,
we'd be in a much better place right now.
Exactly, exactly.
Yeah, I got more votes than Carrie.
Yeah, exactly.
All right, that's a very hopeful prediction, Louis Swisher.
That's very lovely. You always manage to surprise me. Also, exactly. All right, that's a very hopeful prediction, Louis Swisher.
That's very lovely.
You always manage to surprise me.
Also, I'm glad Louis went after me if I had to follow that up
with my lame prediction about corporate politics.
That was the James Stewart moment.
Like, should be in the well of Congress
making that thing.
Did either of you watch last night?
I watched until four in the morning.
I did it. I'm so upset and disturbed by all of it and i had been reading tweets like
continuously for 18 hours and i finally just had to set it aside yeah i would watch some of it if
you were with i thought tammy duckworth was good mitt romney it was quite good um i did watch i
did watch part yeah ted cruz was an irritating i boy, that skinny Iowa boy, Hawley or something? Yeah, Hawley.
He needs to stop. Missouri. He needs to stop.
It's awful. Missouri, Missouri,
sorry. Yeah. But he needs to stop.
We all agree. We all are in agreement
about that. And then Ted Cruz, as usual,
is as despicable as usual.
And rounding out the
ship of fools that is hopefully sailing.
He needs to shave that beard. Oh, really?
I don't like it. Okay, we'll talk to him about it. Alright right. Thank you so much. That's the show, both of you. Casey,
where can listeners find your newsletter? They can find it at platformer.news or on Twitter
at platformer. And Louie, they can find you at NYU doing your homework, right?
Hopefully. Yeah, hopefully. Yeah. We're going to go up again. I'm excited for our little,
we're going to take a little driving trip
and talk to nobody along the entire way.
Scott will be back next week from wherever he is.
I have no idea.
We'll be back.
Prison?
Short prison stint.
We'll be back.
No, he went to school.
He went to school.
He went to school.
We'll be back to playing listener questions.
So send us questions via yappa at nymag.com slash pivot.
Thank you for joining me
Louie and Casey
you're always my favorite
you really are
shh
don't tell Scott
you're my favorite
oh
we're all our favorites
anyway
I'm going to read us out
today's show
was produced by
Rebecca Sinanis
Ernie Inderdot
engineer this episode
thanks also to
Hannah Rosen
make sure you subscribe
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on Apple Podcasts
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If you liked our show, please recommend it to a friend.
Thanks for listening to Pivot from New York Magazine and Vox Media.
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