Pivot - Twitter's Lots of Bots, Netflix Isn't Joking With Employees

Episode Date: May 17, 2022

Disney+ gains subscribers in Q2, but winter may be coming. Kara and Scott discuss Twitter's bot problem, and what it could mean for Elon's takeover bid. Also, a listener question about AirBNB, and a prediction on the future of employment. Send us your Listener Mail questions by calling us at 855-51-PIVOT, or via Yappa, at 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. I'm Kara Swisher.

You want to hear my COVID story? Sure. Yes. Okay. Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher. You want to hear my COVID story? Sure. Yes. Okay. So I thought I was going to advance to the next round. By the way, you're in a bad mood. You need to like let go of some of that energy. I'm in a bad mood because I've got a million things to do. I did an Uber with all the children and Amanda this morning, and I have to get on a plane to Germany, which you're not. And explain why. Because I tested positive for COVID about, I don't know, 10 days ago. And I thought it was my squid games. I thought I was going to get past it.

Of course, I went to Formula One and thinking that if I was surrounded by fabulous people, I wouldn't get it. And I should have stuck to the uncomfortable introvert, hate people, don't do anything. Anyways, one serious note, I'm not giving medical advice. I'm just saying I was prescribed because of our wonderful producer, Laura Naiman, said go get the antiviral Paxlovid. Within 24 hours, nothing. I felt back to normal.

So I'm just saying that is what happened to me. Check with your doctor, but asymptomatic. My ex-wife did the same thing. She was quite sick, and she got it. She also lost the squid games, as you called them, and the COVID squid games. And she was well right away. So I'm alone and I'm bored. And what do I do when I'm alone and I'm bored? I start texting profane things to people. So I'm texting profane things and funny jokes to you guys. And it's like, I don't know, it's like late night, like 1230 AM. We must have, all of us have very unfortunate lives.

Of course, everyone is on the pivot chat on text. And I text something to the extent of, I think it was, my boyfriend's over here, but he's really needy. He keeps asking me to take out the gag ball and unbind him. And then I write, actually, I'm not needy. This lawsuit's going to be easy, but go ahead. Keep going. And then I write, I'm not needy. This lawsuit's going to be easy, but go ahead. Keep going. And then I write, I'm not needy. I'm wanty, in quotes.

And then what I get back is that stupid thing where people go, ha, ha, you know, above it. And I'm like, our pivot team is much saltier and more profane and clever than that. I'm like, that makes no sense. So I look at my text message, and I look at the top of the screen of my text message, and it says Brian Chesky. Yes, yes, I know. And I'm like, oh, my God, I've been sending profane texts at 1230 a.m. You're sexting with the CEO. To the CEO of Airbnb. Yes, you were.

And so I immediately go, I immediately say, Brian, sorry about this. I was texting with my team at work. And then the moment I said that, I'm like, what stranger that I'm texting my colleagues. Just more for the lawsuit. Brian will be brought in to testify. Dirty things from work. Anyways, Brian being the gentleman he is is like, yeah, I figured these weren't for me. Yeah.

But that's my COVID story. Yeah, I texted him right after and I said, I'm so sorry for all the pivot team. And he thought you were funny. There's no coming back from this. There's no coming back from this, Kara. COVID story. Yeah, I texted him right after and I said, I'm so sorry for all the Pippitt team. And he thought you were funny. There's no coming back from this. There's no coming back from this, Kara.

He's like, oh, he's so funny in the way he is. I'm like, that's how we make the money. But nonetheless, apologies. He was very lovely about it.

He is lovely. I think he was bored too. He was bored that night too. Anyway, you cannot have Scott by himself for very long. By the way, did you see Brian's,

Chesky's thing with Obama they announced today? Voyager? Kind of a Peace Corps kind of thing. It's wonderful. He always is doing wonderful things. And they also announced a new redo of the app. It's quite good, actually. Anyway, that is our time with COVID and Scott. That's my COVID story.

Yeah. I am so glad you ghosted me the other night, because I would have possibly had COVID, but I do not. And so I'm on my way to Germany, and Scott is ghosting me in Deutschland. They're piping me in live, though. Little pork, little pork, little beer, little dog. You were supposed to, we were

supposed to hang out and discuss our future together. As usual, you skipped it twice. Once in New York, which I didn't get COVID, and this time in Germany. So I'm hoping that Russia doesn't invade Germany during this time, because that's exactly what will happen when you're not there. No, they're not that bad. Anyway, today, Netflix tells its employees to zip it. There's new data about Twitter bots, and we'll take a listener question about Airbnb and the peer-to-peer economy.

But first, CNN mistakenly sent welcome baskets to employees who were laid off after the CNN Plus shutdown. Scott, did you get any fruit? baskets to employees who were laid off after the CNN Plus shutdown. Scott, did you get any fruit? No basket for the dog. No basket for the dog. And so first off, I just want to acknowledge this is kind of a dumb story and probably someone made an innocent mistake. Yeah. But what's interesting here, and this feeds sort of into the Netflix story, is that you're about to see, I don't want to call them baskets, but if you look at what Netflix said, like either sign up for our content or get the fuck out,

you're about to hear that said about a million times across corporate America in the next six months. We're going to talk about that next, what we're going to do. But did you get a welcome? Did you get any fruit? Did you get any fruit? No fruit. I got something really nice, though.

I can always turn this back to me. What did you get? I went back to my high school to film an episode, which was really rewarding for me, university high school charter. Yeah. And then the next day, the whole thing was unplugged, and my team went ahead and, on their own time, produced the episode for me and said, this is for you and your family. Isn't that nice?

Oh, my God. That is nice. Can you air it anywhere, or do you not have the rights to it? I don't know, but the assumption is they can't, but they took time and they spent, and these things are not easy to edit.

Isn't that nice? That's literally the nice, I think that is the nicest gift I've received from a non-family member. You should air it at the school. You should air it. I will make sure it happens. How about that?

I appreciate that. I will intercede on your behalf. Anyways, that was my basket departing basket. Here's a good news, bad news kind of thing. Pennsylvania Lieutenant Governor John Fetterman, who I know a little bit. I did a Sway episode with him last year, 2019, actually, is recovering from a stroke today. Fetterman is also the favorite to win Pennsylvania's Democratic U.S. Senate race.

The Pennsylvania primary is today. Fetterman first went to the hospital on Friday, but he says he's feeling better and that doctors assure him he hasn't suffered any cognitive damage. I had the similar thing happen to me. His wife was very fast in terms of getting him to the hospital. And so that was great for him in terms of how quickly. And again, I started pivot after my stroke. I got married again after my stroke. I had two more children. So it doesn't stop you from doing anything. It hit home, but I wrote him a note and said, you'll be fine if you get the right treatment. Treatments have gotten so much better, especially among younger people. Yeah, I don't think the story is about Lieutenant Governor. He's going to be fine. He's a big,

strong guy. Sounds like they caught it early. Absolutely no reason that this is going to be a speed bump, nothing else. I think the opportunity here is for a bit of a learning moment. I would love for you to describe a little bit about what happens such that people, I don't know what happens at the beginning of a stroke. Can you talk a little bit about what happened to you and how people can recognize it and seek help? Well, when you think of strokes, you think of older people, but actually more of the strokes are happening to younger people. It was seven, eight years ago, I think it was something like that. And I was flying to Hong Kong. So you were pretty old. You were still pretty old seven, eight years ago.

Yes, I was pretty old. Pretty old. Yeah, I wasn't that old. Anyway, pretty old, pretty old. And it might have been longer. I can't remember. Anyway, I was flying to Hong Kong, and I sat in an economy seat next to two very large men, and I didn't get out of it the whole flight. And I didn't drink enough water. The typical stuff, everything that you talk about. And it turns out I have a hole in my heart, which is, it's a PFO, it's called.

And the dog filled it. Sorry. I know, yeah, yeah, that's what happened. That's what many of your ex-girlfriends have told me as my joke for that one, my little stroke joke. A little stroke joke for you. You have a hole in your heart. Yeah, lots of people. When you're born, everyone has this hole, but then it gets covered up by a

flap of this flap that seals. A lot of people don't seal. 25% of the people have a hole in their heart, which is interesting. Nothing ever happens. And so a blood clot went through it from my leg into my brain. And when I was working on a story about Yahoo at this hotel, I just arrived in Hong Kong. And first I was eating a strawberry and it fell out of my mouth. And it was weird. I couldn't manipulate my lips. And then I got a tingling.

That's all, slight headache. And then I had aphasia, which is I couldn't speak. I was like garbled. I couldn't, it was weird. I went to the mirror and I tried to say, I know it sounds crazy, My Baloney Has a First Name, you know that song? I started to sing that.

I don't know why that popped in my head. But I started to do it and it came out all garbled. And then I, so I couldn't reach anybody because I couldn't talk. So I texted my brother, Jeff, Dr. Swisher. And the time difference was such, I think he was sleeping or whatever. And so I was like, this, Dr. Swisher. And the time difference was such that I think he was sleeping or whatever. And so I was like, this is weird. Huh? I had a little, my migraine, I had migraines for years.

You weren't scared? I would have been terrified. No, I thought I had a migraine. I thought I had a severe migraine. And you couldn't speak? You thought you had a migraine? You're in a Hong Kong hotel and you can't speak and you weren't terrified? I know this sounds crazy. And I went upstairs for breakfast. And by the time I got upstairs, I could speak. It was like as if I had dental surgery. I was like, hello, how are you doing? And then in a half an hour, I was like this, like talking like this. So the phone rang. I was at this beautiful breakfast looking over Hong Kong Harbor. And my brother said, get to the hospital now. And I was like, what are you talking about? It's just a headache. And he said, could you

please get yourself in a cab, go to the hospital. You need an MRI, not a CAT scan or whatever. I don't remember which one it was. And get there right now, you're having a stroke. And I'm like, you're crazy. Young people, you know, I was just way too young to have a stroke. That's the nuttiest thing in the world. So I went and as it turns out, I was having a stroke and it had already worked its way around the clot, which was to look at it was kind of beautiful in a way because the blood had flown around it. And so they got me on anti, you know, the medications, the blood thinners. And I was in the hospital for seven days, but I was perfectly fine within an hour. It was crazy.

And then they wanted to operate in China and then U.S. people didn't think that was worth it because all these things. So I still have the hole in my heart. I just, you know, that's why I have my, for my trip to Germany, I'm wearing my little leggings, my leggings. You know, we've all, everyone close to you has been so desperately trying to fill that hole for the longest time. No. It's, it was very, you know, it changed my life know it changed my life it changed my life i have to say because i didn't like there was a woman who wrote about strokes that embraced it like she was sort of embracing of it and i was like no this was terrible but i'll tell you one thing my dad died

when i was really young and so i i like it my kids were pretty young at the time and and i thought oh my god my kids and they're gonna have no parent like one one of their parents is gonna be gone obviously megan was there um but it was really um i i that's the only time i cried when i thought about my kids and me and me not being there and i think i was crying for myself obviously and so um so anyway so it was good and then i took medications for a while and then i stopped and I just take an aspirin now. Blood thinners are really, really hard on the body. But now, today, they have all this stuff.

They have all this. Lots of younger people are getting them. If you feel like you're getting a stroke, immediately go to the hospital. Don't assume it's not a stroke. I think that's the lesson here, right? It's called FAST. I forget what it stands for, but you've got to get there fast. I did.

John Fetterman did. And I wish him a good recovery. Yeah, you can be just fine. I think about it every now and then that it could happen again, but I could also get hit by a car. The thing I take from this is it clearly means you're going to be a senator. I don't know. That would be fun. I would definitely be your legislative aide.

Oh, my God. No, because as usual, you'd text like Nancy Pelosi dirty text by accident when you were texting the staff, which would also get us into trouble. Can you believe that? Anyway. The thing is you can believe that happened, right? Yeah, I can. I totally can. I literally—

Could have been worse. Could have been worse. Oh, I don't know. It could have been Elon. That's what I said. Could have been Elon. Could have been Elon if I gave you his cell phone number. Anyway, so just acknowledgement that this turned out well.

It did not turn out well for the people in Buffalo. A terrible shooting over the weekend is raising new questions about content moderation and online radicalization. Once again, a man, I'm going to call him a man because he's not a teen. I mean, he is a teen, but he's a man, went in and shot and killed 10 people. It's so depressing. We'll get to this on a later episode. We have more information. But we wanted to acknowledge the awful event and extend our condolences to Buffalo.

It's a wonderful city. It's a wonderful city. And this is just beyond depressing. Yeah, when we saw it last night, I said, what are we going to say that hasn't already been said? But I do think there's, these things have so many second-order effects. There will continue to be a needed conversation around gun control, and one of the great, Lex, you know, great tragedies of our leadership is their inability to go where most NRA members

are now, and that is we need some sort of sensible gun control. But where I go is I could tell you who this was before I heard who it was. And that is a young man. Like you said last week. Who is not connecting to work, not connecting to school. I really think that men have a responsibility and our communities have a responsibility to be more engaged in boys' lives. And I'm not forgiving him.

I'm not blaming it on society or other people. But you also, also, social media, did you notice, like, mass shooters aren't being inspired by video games or podcasts or streaming original scripted television. They're being inspired by shit they're seeing live streamed on Facebook. They're being inspired by manifestos that are allowed to sit and fester on these social media platforms. And they see other men agreeing with these manifestos. And fucking Twitch comes out and says, as if it was a good thing.

Well, we took this down within two minutes. I'm like, what? How the hell did this thing ever get started? How the hell did you ever let this thing? Well, these are open platforms. They're open platforms. That's the problem. They could absolutely stop this shit.

They're open platforms. I think you're wrong. I think they can't. I think that's the problem. You don't think there's a technical solution here? No, and I think it proliferates everywhere. It gets copies. People were looking at this thing.

By accident, I came across one when I was reading about the news. It was right there where he said he was sorry to a white guy because he looked like he was going to say, sorry, I wasn't going to shoot you. It was obviously targeting black people. And the other thing that makes me think about I want to move to a little bit of solutions and I want to be part of the solution here. I want to move to a little bit of solutions, and I want to be part of the solution here. I really do think that people and also especially young men, you need to take the temperature down. So I want to reference something that happened on a Twitter space that you did the other night. By the way, I thought it was really productive.

I thought you did a great job. We had someone basically, you know, I don't know, photobomb or crash the session and start calling someone his exact words. This is a well-respected or, you know, a famous person. Call a guest on your, a fucking coward, a fucking shithead, a fucking piece of shit screaming at him. And this guy has millions of young men following him. And then I went on and then I started getting, and I, of course, and I want to say, I handled it poorly.

I immediately got angry and said, you're right, one of you is a piece of shit. That doesn't help either. I thought that was okay. Well, anyways, if you're going to take the temperature down, you can't respond to shit like this. And I was angry at myself for taking this bait. But then, all of a sudden,

my Twitter feed starts getting all this foul shit. And I reverse engineer to this individual's 2 million followers, and they're all saying, put Scott Galloway on the list. Put Scott on the list. All of these things. I'm like, what's the list? This individual has a list, and it's called People I Hate. And it's a video showing in animation all the people he hates. Now, what does that do? His two million followers start harassing these people. When you start assembling lists with the implicit or explicit notion that people, your mob should start harassing those people, that has serious fascist vibes, dude. And what I would say to the two million people following this individual, he is making millions of dollars tapping into a very ugly side of this.

And ask yourself, are you being a real man by engaging in this? When you start harassing people, when you start being this obnoxious, this incendiary, this foul, this is – I want to be clear. This isn't a mass shooting, but all of this leads to the atmospherics where young men start believing that hate and violence is somehow masculine. Young men have an obligation. Or dunking on people, or dunking on people.

And it starts at a very innocent level. And I want to be part of the solution. I am no longer responding. Unless someone is much more powerful to me, I'm not going to say anything bad about anybody. I'm just not going to go there. Okay. You're just going to send sex notes to them. Okay. Well, why don't you do that? That's a little bit of, I'm filling people's hearts. I'm filling the holes in people's hearts. Anyway, you are absolutely correct. In fact, one of my sons, Alex, was asking why I was sort of irritated with a lot of the Elon tweets. I'm like, he's just now doing the dunking thing, which is just exhausting.

Like, he's so much smarter than that. Like, why? Because it gets response. And it's like a seal clapping for fish. It's just depressing. But it leads, if letter Z is a mass shooting, it's letter B. You're encouraging, these people go, this is the most – a lot of young men, for a lot of good reasons, say, this is the most impressive man in the world. I want to be like this.

Yeah. And I need to go after people who don't agree with me. I need to insult people. And guess what? All of these communities, they're overly male. They're much less likely to believe in climate change. They're much less likely to believe in climate change. They're much more likely to believe in misogynistic content. Yeah.

And if you're a young man, say no to this shit. Just say no. My God, I can't believe I'm being Nancy Reagan. Yeah. This young man didn't just happen, let's just say. Let's just say. Anyway, let's get to our first big story. Disney is poised for a big upset in the streaming market.

Last week, it reported that Disney Plus added nearly 8 million subscribers in Q2. Netflix lost 200,000 subscribers in the same quarter. Still, Disney is losing money in streaming. It announced an operating loss of nearly $900 million. That's more than triple its loss from the same quarter. Still, Disney is losing money in streaming. It announced an operating loss of nearly $900 million. That's more than triple its loss from the same quarter last year. Now, analysts at LightShed Partners are suggesting that Disney buy Netflix, maybe even sell at stake in Hulu to make that happen. They've suggested the game platform Roblox is another acquisition target. The mouse sort of roared over Florida, by the way. What do you think of all these ideas? Bob Chapik, who's the CEO,

who's gotten into some trouble recently, has said that Disney Plus will add 100 million subscribers and achieve profitability by 2024. Wow. He's to raise prices, I guess. But I have to say, Disney's a must-own on my network,

for sure, for all my kids. And their age is 20 to six months. I mean, the six-month-old doesn't watch it, but it's a must-own as a subscription. What do you think about this? Should it buy Netflix? I don't. I mean, the six-month-old doesn't watch it, but it's a must-own as a subscription. What do you think about this? Should it buy Netflix? I don't. I personally, so Disney has $190 billion market cap. Netflix is 80. They would have to pay 120. So they basically would have to give, I mean, with a combined company, they'd have to give Netflix shareholders 40% of the company. And I think Disney has a much more diverse revenue stream.

Right now, they're not only nipping at Netflix's heels, they've taken the leg into its mouth. They have momentum. They have an unparalleled library. I mean, you're talking about Star Wars and Dumbo. I mean, they have everything in between. And they're adding to it. Actually, they're franchising it, whether it's Mandalorian. And if you look at the difference between Hulu and Netflix, there isn't a whole lot. I mean, Disney is singular

in terms of its positioning. It's family. It's singular. There's nothing that's even close to it in terms of that positioning around every household can kind of say, I'd like to have Disney+.

There's some folks on the far right and the far left that don't like different streamers for different reasons. Everybody, anyone with kids and even who just loves great entertainment is going to love Disney. So I don't think Disney needs to acquire Netflix. The broader learning here is that, and I'll backward integrate in my statement, to not be watching a lot of original scripted television right now is to ignore the defining art form of our generation. And that is somewhere between $140 to $240 billion a year, depending if you're looking

at domestically or globally, of resources are being poured into the art form of original television. It's unlikely there's several billion dollars going into what's number two? I don't know. Cable television or modern art. This is the defining art. The most talented people in the world backed by more resources in the world are creating this content. And guess what? They've way overinvested.

And you want to talk about a lot of baskets that are going to go on? All right. Go ahead. I want to know if you think – what about Roblox or Roku merging with Netflix? I think Roku and Roblox are both outstanding acquisition targets for different reasons. Roku offers a vertical distribution to Netflix and or Disney and is way off its high and now has a $12 billion market cap. or Disney and is way off its high and now has a $12 billion market cap. That is a very interesting acquisition for Netflix or Disney because they control so much of the distribution. That's an outstanding acquisition. And they've been doing some original content, but go ahead.

And Roblox, immediately overnight, 50% of people under the age of 16 are on Roblox. I think Roblox would be a gangster acquisition for Disney. So Roku, I think, would be an incredible acquisition for Netflix for vertical distribution, which Netflix lacks. And Roblox would immediately sent among their core audience, Disney, incredible gaming. It's got a $20 billion market cap. Same thing with Netflix, too. Netflix could buy that, too, since they're getting into gaming. That isn't as obvious to me because it's not subscription. And then do more children's programming.

I have to say, the other night I was at home and I was doing folding clothes. It sounds crazy, but I picked up four different shows on Netflix I could find. I cannot find stuff on Disney. I want to re-watch Marvel. So they can live together, but Netflix needs more heft for sure. I think if Netflix were going to acquire a company, it should be Spotify

and be the ultimate content or media subscription company. I've always thought that. Yep, that's a great one. That's a great one. Well, we'll see what they do because they are also giving its employees a content advisory

and an update to the company's culture guidelines. Netflix tells employees they may have to work on content they disagree with. The spokesman said the change was meant to help prospective employees make better informed decisions about working for Netflix. This is obviously around the Dave Chappelle thing. You know, it had been, it's also been cutting its marketing staff, not enormously, but it made cuts. What do you think of this? It's just given the warnings? Is it doing a, you know, a base camp kind of thing? What do you think of this? It's just giving the warnings? Is it doing a base camp kind of thing? What do you think? This is a big story.

And the reason why this is a big story is it indicates a much bigger trend. A tsunami is forming offshore, Kara. A tsunami? Okay. All right. And this is a tsunami. Just as there's work from home has been one of the biggest trends in 2021, one of the biggest trends in the last half of 2022 is unemployed from home has been one of the biggest trends in 20 and 21. One of the biggest trends in the

last half of 2022 is unemployed from home. And that is all of these growthy companies that hired hundreds of thousands or millions of people because as long as they were growing, their stock prices went up. Their stock prices are off 60 or 70%. And I can tell you, and I have personal experience with this, in every boardroom and in every executive management meeting, there is behind drawn curtains or drawn blinds, charts of every department, and they're going through layoffs. You are about to see hundreds of thousands, if not millions of people in the part of the economy that has been the gift that has kept on giving basically since 2008 start massive layoffs. And this is the first signal, and that is, you know what, guys?

You want to work from home? You want to bring your full self to work? You want to tell us your political views? I got an idea. Stay at home and watch MSNBC or Fox all the time. You're out of here. Because this is – and you know what was really interesting and I thought telling? What?

The head of product for Twitter got fired. I forget his name. Yes, Kayvon Beckpour. And he immediately went to Twitter and said, I was disappointed this happened during paternity leave. He was indignant. No, he wasn't. Yeah.

I know Kayvon really well. I'm going to, you're mischaracterizing it, but go ahead. No, I'm not. He immediately brought up that he was fired during paternity leave. He's just making the point. He didn't. I know Kayvon really well. I'm going to—you're mischaracterizing it, but go ahead. No, I'm not. He immediately brought up that he was fired during paternity leave. He's just making the point. He didn't disagree. Yeah, he's being indignant. No, he wasn't, but go ahead.

Okay. I'm going to disagree. The last time there were layoffs of the information age, you know, nice people with college degrees in engineering was in 2000. We didn't have paternity leave. Right. Okay. In 2000, we didn't have paternity leave. Right.

Okay. Literally, these individuals are under the impression that the universe owes them a job and snacks. I'm going to push back on Kayvon, but go ahead. Go ahead. Make your larger point. You're about to see a lot of people say, oh, you want to work from home? Good for you. You're now unemployed from home. All of a sudden, the pendulum in the place where workers have aggregated more and more and more power over the last 20 years is about to swing back to the employer.

I think it's going to be a big fight because I don't think – there is still leverage on the part of a lot of employees in this case. Like, look at Apple. The guy had a machine learning there. Big job. Left because he doesn't want to go back to the spaceship. All kinds of people. See, I see it differently. I see it as he was fired. Fine. You want to stay at home? Stay at home. Huh. Okay. All right. I don't think they would have said that six months ago. You're about to see a lot of people decide, well, maybe I should

go into work. Maybe I should have some face time. Yeah. All right. Okay. That's interesting. I have to say just from dropping everyone off today, because Kara is now an Uber driver, the roads are packed. People were walking downtown because I had to drop Amanda off downtown. She's working there. And it was felt like, oh my God, people are going back to work at the same time. Long story, she got in a car accident and we had to rent a car. You can't reach people at any, they're so, and they were telling me it's because of no unemployment. Her parents were going back to Boston last night. They delayed or canceled trips. You know, I mean, it's just people aren't working too. Like it's, they're having a real employment crisis in a lot of places

that are pretty good jobs, I would say, but go ahead. But that's the nuance here. And that's exactly the correct point. And it's going to be a tale of two worlds. And the market, to be fair, the market is responding to this. For the last 30 years, people have had to bring you your Cobb salad, wash your car, whatever it might be, board you to your plane, bring you your ginger ale in aisle 17B, and those people have been underpaid for 30 years, and there is a vicious and overdue snapback. I went to, for the first time, one of those customer service desks at an airport the other day, and they can't find anyone to work there. And clearly, the training is so tough. They just can't find anyone. There's just

no way out. They're going to have to dramatically raise compensation. And then this is a good thing among frontline workers. The other side, recessions have different impacts. Some recessions are bad for blue collar workers. Some recessions are bad for white collar workers. This recession is going to be really bad, not only for white collarcollar workers, but white Patagonia-vested workers, and that is information age workers. All of the people who are used to bringing their dog to their living room to work, all the information age guys, all of the techie – the unicorn stable is about to get so ugly and foul. And this generation has never seen it. They've never seen it. This is correct.

This is correct. Yeah, it'll be interesting to see what happens, because when I do talk to them, I don't feel like working at the office. Someone I was talking to, I was like, hmm, that's a bad choice for you, for a young person, I have to say. But I didn't say anything, of course. Anyway, it's a really interesting time. I think that Netflix is doing this because they just don't want to go through the headache, and then they can point to it and say, we told you. If you don't like it, you can protest all you want, but we told you, and it's a problem for us for you to do that. Anyway, we'll see what

happens. I like this production, Scott. I think it's really interesting, a white collar with a Patagonia vest recession. All right, let's go on a quick break. And when we come back, we'll talk about Twitter bots. And we'll take a listener question about Airbnb, who is headed by a man who has incredible patience with my co-host. Fox Creative. This is advertiser content from Zelle. When you picture an online scammer, what do you see? For the longest time, we have these images of somebody sitting crouched over their computer with a hoodie on, just kind of typing away in the middle of the night.

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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 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. Support for the show comes from Alex Partners. to only send money to people you know and trust. your company knows what really matters when it comes to AI. As part of their 2024 tech sector report, Alex Partners spoke with nearly 350 tech executives from across North America and Europe to dig deeper into how tech companies are responding to these changing headwinds. And in their 2024 digital disruption report, Alex Partners found that 88% of executives

report seeing potential for growth from digital disruption, with 37% seeing significant or even extremely high positive impact on revenue growth. You can read both reports and learn how to convert digital disruption into revenue growth at www.alexpartners.com. That's www.alexpartners.com. www.alixpartners.com slash V-O-X. In the face of disruption, businesses trust Alex Partners to get straight to the point and deliver results when it really matters. Surprise, surprise. Twitter is full of bots, at least according to one survey. The study looked at 44,000 accounts and found that nearly 20% were likely bots. The same survey found that a majority of Elon Musk's Twitter followers were likely bots.

So this is something Elon has brought up for his deal pause, which he really can't pause a deal on this thing, that he needs some more information about scams and bots. So bot has a negative connotation also. Some bots can be useful, like my favorite, ElonJet. What do you think of this? This is this, it's still, I don't know what's going to happen in this deal. I mean, it looks like, you know, I talked to a lot of Wall Street people this weekend and they were like, you can't pause a deal. You could try to underprice it, but it's bad form.

And he's just going to be sued. That was sort of the takeaway. So, but in terms of bots, he's correct. It just doesn't matter from what I understand. Well, okay. So I want all my money back. I've been using a shower wash for 20 years and it hasn't regrown my hair.

And I've just realized that. And so I want all my money back. I mean, the notion when Musk put that deal on pause and claimed it was because all of a sudden he's shocked that maybe more than 5% of Twitter followers are bots. He might as well have put out a tweet that said, I think you're all fucking idiots and will believe anything I say. Yes. and will believe anything I say. Because that same analysis you referenced reflected that 72% of his followers are fake or spam accounts. And those people have all been pumping up Tesla and attacking anyone who in any way wants to discuss. But, oh, he's shocked. Kara, he's shocked.

He's just shocked that more than 5% of Twitter followers are spam. He also curiously focused on the timeline thing, which was one was the algorithmic one and the other is chronological. And as your home. And he was like, look what they're doing. I'm like, they put out a press release months ago. Everybody and their mother wrote long stories on it. It was like he was showing everybody a magic trick. And I was like, this was not, you might not have known it, but it was written.

And nobody paid, no one wrote about it. I'm like, everybody wrote about it. It was an interesting, like he's doing this, like the big reveal, there are bots. The big reveal, you're being controlled by an algorithm. The big reveal, that kind of stuff. Okay, so this is what's going on. It's the big reveal. Go ahead, yes.

When you started acquiring shares, the stock was at 32. On average, any peer stock is down between 20 and 40%. The natural level of Twitter right now would be 22 to 25 bucks without this acquisition. I'm going to check the stock right now while you're talking. Go ahead. Okay, it's down. It's at 38. The acquisition price is at 54.

It's off 33%. Typically, you expect like an 8% return in the markets. This is supposed to, the deal is supposed to be done in six months. The stock should be trading. If in fact, the market thought this deal was going to go through, you get a discount, right? The stock should be trading at 52 or 53. It's trading at 38, which if you do the math, says that the market, which absorbs millions of points in a motion, says that the deal, the likelihood of this deal not closing is now 70 or 80 percent. And people say, well, he's negotiating for a lower price. He will not be able to negotiate a price low enough to reflect the actual value of Twitter or anything that makes any economic sense.

So all of this is right now, Cara, is him trying to strategize, right? The least damaging exit wound, the least damaging breakup payment, the least damaging court settlement against him when he breaks the purchase agreement and doesn't show up with $45 billion, which he is legally obligated to do. But again, I don't see practically how you force him to do this. So all this is is a group of lawyers saying, under his direction, figure out a way to create as much confusion, somewhat legitimate reasoning to get me out of this fucking Vietnam right

now, taking as few multibbillion dollar bullets as possible. Yeah, we'll see. I mean, what's interesting, he actually interestingly stepped it back. A lot of us were like, it was well covered and everybody knew it. But okay, I'm not suggesting malice in the algorithm, but rather it's trying to guess

what you might want to read and in doing so inadvertently manipulate, amplify your viewpoints without you realizing what's happening. This is, you know, go over to TikTok. Hello, sir. It was just interesting. He just figured that out?

You know, you know, Nilay Patel wrote back, wait till you try TikTok. That'll really bake your noodle. And then he wrote back, try TikTok, but it's not winding my clock. But, you know, I agree. I think he's trying to figure out. He is funny. He is really good on Twitter. He is funny.

And then he just wrote, iconic, laconic, platonic, with an exclamation point. I don't even know what he's doing. Tell me you do edibles without telling me you're doing edibles. Right. No, I agree.

No, I agree. It's interesting. And then he's attacking California, which has a budget surplus. I mean, honestly, it's just ridiculous. So it's interesting because in this bot area, Power Agrawal, who's the CEO of Twitter, responded to Elon, obviously, saying, let's talk about spam and let's do so.

He just did this 35 minutes ago with the benefit of data, facts and contents. In other words, you dumbass. First, let me state the obvious. Spam harms the experience for real people on Twitter and therefore can harm our business. As such, we are strongly incentivized to detect and remove as much spam as we possibly can every single day. Anyone who suggests otherwise is wrong. And then he goes on and does say we suspend over a half a million spam accounts every day. We also lock millions of accounts we suspect may be spam. The hard challenge, which look fake but superficial, are actually real people, blah, blah, blah, blah. It goes on and on and on and on and on. It's like 10 or 12 or something like that.

There's lots of details, very important underneath the high-level description. We shared this over here in Estimation Process with Elon a week ago and look forward to continuing the conversation with him and all of you. So I'm not sure what he's doing here, but he's doing something. It reminds me when Sheryl Sandberg said that trust is our most valuable asset, and why would we ever intentionally violate the trust of our users? And the answer is because what's incorrect about that statement is no, he actually has a financial incentive to create false flags or false signals around user engagement and bots that create more and more impressions such that they can sell Nissan ads

and claim to Nissan that this ad was seen by X millions of people and not say, well, actually, it's only being seen by one out of third people that we report. So the financial incentives are there for them to ignore this, except for the most blatant. They could enforce identity. The bottom line is, right now, with that statement, he's the second most full of shit person in the world regarding Twitter, just behind Elon. And I'm sorry I'm hopping around, but I can't help it. You know what has become super interesting to track? Every time Twitter stock goes down because of the likelihood or the reduced likelihood that the acquisition gets closed, Truth Social goes up. the reduced likelihood that the acquisition gets closed, Truth Social goes up.

Truth Social is now trading on whether or not they think Elon will get control of Twitter. And if he gets control, it means Trump goes on there. If he doesn't get control, it means Trump stays on Truth Social. So every time the likelihood of a deal, that must goes down. That's totally separate from this, yeah. So Truth Social is up in a down market substantially today because the likelihood that Musk gets Twitter and Trump goes on Twitter has gone down. It's so interesting. The likelihood of this deal going through is now controlling True Social stock. Anyways, a bit of a digression.

Anyhow, the bot issue is a big issue, and it should be cleaned up by all these people. Let's move away from Elon part of it. This has been a ridiculous problem, including getting people all jazzed up about, in a good way and a bad way, right, about things. And especially young men getting them all excited because they think everyone's in on the joke or let's all pile on and be assholes. So, it's a real—bots are a real problem, except when they're useful, which is sometimes. So I'd be willing to give up those cute little bots to get rid of all of them. I really think it's the sewer of the internet. It is.

You know what it is? It's one thing if someone disagrees with you, but when they have a mask on or they create hundreds of fake people to yell at you outside your house. Yeah, they're peeing all over the place. And they're anonymous and you don't know their true intentions. It really is. And the sales team at Twitter and the CEOs there for a long time have all ignored it because that way they can lie to their advertisers and say, look at our daily active usage. Yeah, yeah, I agree. I think you get particularly attacked by bots.

You can just see it. I'd love to have someone look at your feed, like who's attacking you. Oh, I have. You get a lot of bots. I have. Yeah, bots, bots, bots, bots. I know this sounds paranoid. It's a mix of Troll Farm sponsored by Russia and it's bots sponsored by venture capitalists whose septic tank they call

their portfolio, I have questioned. All right. Okay. Well, in any case, big deal, but not to this deal. Anyway, Scott, let's get 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 one came from email, Bill from Vermont, so I'll read it. Hi, Jungle Cat and Dog. I enjoyed your podcast. Thank you for the useful content. You both praise Airbnb, but I was hoping to get your thoughts on its destructive impact.

In Vermont, there's a housing shortage for middle-class housing, while many houses are basically vacant, except for one to two weekends a month when rich people from Boston or New York come up and rent them. This allows owners to pay the mortgage, but actually damaging the community. Regular Vermonters are priced out of owning a house. Communities are hurt because many houses are primarily vacant, and then they're occupied. Often it's a party of a dozen people for a weekend, which is annoying. Hospitality businesses are hurt because they lose customers.

I assume many communities are dealing with this. How can Airbnb be structured in a way that doesn't remove the huge swaths of housing from inventory for long-term renters? Bill, that's a very good question. It's been the longest question for Airbnb forever, in cities mostly. I have to say, in Vermont, I'm going to push back. People have owned their homes there and rented them forever, rich people coming from Boston and New York. And so I don't know that you'd be owning this house if they weren't, but for them. So I think they've always been doing it and just Airbnb makes it easier. So I don't think people were staying at hotels except to do this. They were renting places up in that area. I don't know.

What do you think? Yeah, I have a bias here. Airbnb is my largest holding and I'm an enormous, I like Brian Chesky so much that I send him dirty text messages at 1230 at night. So I have a bias here. But one, it's a nuanced argument. There's a lot of people that can afford their house because they Airbnb it. So it actually makes housing more affordable for some people. Now, having said that, when somebody, what I do agree with, when somebody goes into the business of Airbnb-ing and they rent 10 apartments and then they turn them into full-time Airbnb and they don't pay taxes, the hotel taxes that support our infrastructure. But they do.

Well, they've started, but it's still spotty. No, no, they do. No, it's not. It's not. It's not. It's not. You're saying that in every state, Airbnb is— I think in every state they're required to, yes, 100%.

That was water under the bridge for them. Okay, so there's the tax issue, and it sounds like I'm going to defer to you on this because it sounds like you're more knowledgeable on that. But there's also an issue around I buy properties and rent them out, and I've been doing that for over a decade. And there are developers now who say we need these homes in the community so investors can only buy a certain number. And I think there's some legitimacy to that, that if you're in the business, that certain cities might say, if you own the home, fine, you can Airbnb it. Or if it's your primary residence, you can Airbnb it. I do think it makes sense to limit the number of units that can be— Opportunistic Airbnb. Yeah, that can be – Opportunistic Airbnb.

Yeah, that can be taken off the market for the sole purpose because what you're doing is basically converting residential into rental. Or possible residential. But I would argue that this company based on – if you look at any company that's reached $100 billion in tech, I would argue the emissions and the externalities are as low or lower here than any other company that's created $100 billion in shareholder value. And also, I think Brian – I'm a total sycophant here. I think Brian is very attuned to this issue and has tried to be responsive to it. But I think it's a legitimate question. Well, they still have the party issue thing and what he's talking about, 10 people. Have you stayed at a hotel?

I party in hotels. What's the difference? I get that. I'm just saying parties in the houses and neighborhoods. I try to have 10 people. Have you stayed at a hotel? I party in hotels. What's the difference? I get that. I'm just saying parties in the house is a neighborhood. I try to have orgies. No one shows up. There's a difference between having a party in someone's neighborhood versus in a hotel setting,

but that's okay. That's fine. I think one of the issues, this is going to be their issue forever. It's sort of a push-pull between people who are using their homes as capital and in a capitalist way, which they should be able to, and people who live in

neighborhoods who don't like people tromping through with their pulled suitcases, often in just cities. And in this case in Vermont, Vermont is a vacation state. I think tourism, I don't know if it's the biggest, but it's got to be right at the top. I think people have been doing this for years. They just, people have more of an opportunity to rent them than they used to maybe. And maybe there's more in and out. And that could help the whole community if more people go visit places. I know that Brian talked about, you know, people living in places longer, rural areas that are relatively close to the city. But, you know, I think this is going to be a problem no matter what, as people exercise their real estate for capitalism, if they want to.

exercise their real estate for capitalism if they want to. But Scott's right. If there's sort of people that would have otherwise built homes for regular people who are living there full-time, it could create a screw-up in the marketplace. You're going to see more stories on this because we're with one- and two-bedroom apartments across America on average up here on your 20% and 28%. You're just going to see a housing crisis. You're going to see a lot of people living out of their cars. This is going to be a really big issue. Anyway, Scott, one more quick break. We'll be back for predictions. Thumbtack presents the ins and outs of caring for your home. Out. Indecision, overthinking, second-guessing every choice you make.

In. Plans and guides that make it easy to get home projects done. Out. Beige on beige on beige. In. Knowing what to do, when to do it, and who to hire. Start caring for your home with confidence. Download Thumbtack today. 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 some predictions. You kind of made a couple of the tsunami thing with the fleece people. No, my prediction comes from,

I'm part of the founder and CEO of this great – this kind of hot VC firm, Activant. And the guy who started it was a guy named Steve Saraceno, and I spoke to him over the weekend. He said, you're about to see inflation's heavy hand. The only means of controlling inflation or that will inadvertently help inflation is, he says, you're about to see the great layoff. help inflation is you said you're about to see the great layoff, and it's going to be amongst the unicorn folks that we have been just hiring everyone for so long. And it didn't matter. Just grow, just grow, just grow. Pay them what they want. These companies now are going to go into a room and go, we need to reduce SG&A by 20 or 30 percent. And they're going to—I mean, it's just happening. It's happening everywhere. And they're in the planning stages right now. People are being thoughtful.

You're going to see every 24 hours one to three stories. You know, that— This is mostly tech. You're talking about mostly tech. Oh, no. It's the slang of the unicorns. Call it whatever you want to call. Frontline workers, our employment is going to be really strong. You know, Panera, we just can't get. We can't find people fast enough. And we need people, and people have money. It's going to be the slaughter of the unicorns or the jockeys. I don't know what the right metaphor is.

But you're about to see the great information age layoff over the next 6 to 12 months. information age layoff over the next six to twelve months. That company, that site, Layoff Tracker, is about to get really,

really active. All right. All right. And the meanwhile, Panera, can I get a job there? I would like to make sandwiches. They're really nice people,

by the way. I know. The management team are really nice. How are they keeping, how are they getting people more money, right? They're paying more

and they're also very serious about worker training and trying and offering healthy food and trying to fashion a career. They lift people out of their cafes into management. They're really like, anyways, I'm biased. I served on the board there, but the management team there is willing to sacrifice profits. They're going to have to. They're going to have to. They're not going to be choice. But by the way, just so you know, their business is killing it. Killing it. People can't wait to get out of the house right now and order- Every restaurant business, crazy. Everywhere

I go now, it's packed. And you want to hear another great stat? Over 50% of their orders start digitally. Ah, sure. Isn't that crazy? Same thing with Starbucks. I go to the Starbucks, but I do it digitally. No, not at all. I think it makes perfect sense. Okay, Scott, let's go for today.

I'm going to get on a plane for Germany. I love fly routing. How are you getting to Germany? Where are you? How are you getting there? Through Frankfurt. Going through Frankfurt. What do you love to fly to?

This is Lufthansa, yes. Oh, it's Lufthansa. Yes. Yes, wind dancer. Wind dancer. That's what it means. That's right. Yes. Are you going to do a German accent to the Germans? Please don't. We have the economy comfort where we call it Poland and we invade it

mid-flight. You know what? I'm so glad you're not on my flight in any case. They love me in Germany. I'm big in Germany. Perhaps, but not with a fake German accent. By the way, the big rumor is Lou Vandowski is coming to Chelsea. That is big news in this household. I don't know what that is. Okay.

Supposedly Lukaku might be going to Bayern Munich. This is big news. I don't care. I do not care. Do you know who I'm going to see in Germany you're going to miss? Ashton Kutcher. Oh, that's right. You're interviewing Ashton Kutcher.

Ashton's very handsome. I met him once. Yep. God, I couldn't stop looking at him. Ashton is very handsome. Yeah. And he's a tech investor too, right? Very successful one. Yes, actually. He's a lovely guy. What else are you doing at the conference that I can't go to? Oh, I'm cleaning up a lot of your mess is what I'm doing. You better bring a big shovel, my darling. That's a lot of cleanup on Isle Dog. There better be a check, a Kara Swisher check headed my way. I'm sorry, who got us invited?

You did, but you're not there. It doesn't matter. That's right. I'm literally like, well, I must bring my wife, Kara. And they're like, oh, we love the Kara Swisher. All right, get it out of your system.

Love Germany. I'm going to the Royal Premier of Top Gun in London. I'm going to fly to London for one day, just so you know. That's pretty awesome. Is Tom Cruise going to be there? I'm going to the Royal Premier of Top Gun in London. I'm going to fly to London for one day, just so you know. That's pretty awesome. Is Tom Cruise going to be there? I'm so excited. I'm going to totally like, should I? Yes, I'm going to totally bear hug him. You think that'll work? I would bet Tom Cruise would really like it. I've always kind of soft spot for Tom Cruise. Something about him being a great actor and really handsome and a leading man. I guess. I just can't get past the Scientology, but nonetheless.

Okay. Everyone has their issues. Okay. Well, that's a biggie. Okay. Will you get a selfie with Tom Cruise? I'll try. I'll try my best. I'll try.

I don't think they're going to let me near him. Anyway, that is the show. We'll be back on Friday for more. Scott, read us out. And please don't do it in a German accent. Thank you. Today's show was produced by Lara Naim and Evan Engel and Taylor Griffin. Ernie Indertot engineered this episode.

Thanks also to Drew Burrows and Neil Severo. Make sure you subscribe to the show wherever you listen to podcasts. Thank you for listening to Pivot from New York Magazine and Vox Media. We'll be back later this week for another breakdown of all things tech and business. Lou Vondosky coming to Chelsea. Swisher going to Hamburg. The world has been turned upside down. Farfing Nugent, Kara. Farfing Nugent.