Pivot - Twitter’s new audio innovation, Apple’s dominance gets a closer look and a prediction on the impact of online trading apps on mental health

Episode Date: June 19, 2020

Kara and Scott talk about Twitter's new feature that allows certain users to post audio recordings. They also get talk about Pinterest reconciling with claims from Black employees that the company has internal racist practices. In big stories, the Department of Justice released a recommendation that portions of Section 230 be repealed. Meanwhile, Basecamp's new email service Hey.com is claiming that Apple has been abusing its power in the App Store. Scott predicts there will be negative impacts on mental health due to online trading apps. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Support for Pivot comes from Virgin Atlantic. Too many of us are so focused on getting to our destination that we forgot to embrace the journey. Well, when you fly Virgin Atlantic, that memorable trip begins right from the moment you check in. On board, you'll find everything you need to relax, recharge, or carry on working. Buy flat, private suites, fast Wi-Fi,

hours of entertainment, delicious dining, and warm, welcoming service that's designed around you. Check out virginatlantic.com for your next trip to London and beyond and see for yourself how traveling for business can always be a pleasure. Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from the Vox Media Podcast Network. Get started at HubSpot.com slash marketers. No, but seriously, there's another big piece about how wonderful you are. And I'm like a sidekick. I'm like, I've been relegated to sidekick lesbian straight man status, which is my favorite. I'm moving on, Kara. I'm moving on. You're Dayton Hudson. I'm Target. I have outgrown you. I have outgrown you. See you later. Don't let the door get in your way. As my dad said to my mom, his second wife in 1973, I've outgrown you. All right.

Okay. Go ahead. I've outgrown you. I'm moving on to number three. Let's see how that works out for you, sir. By the way, thanks for the nice words. You said some nice things about me. I appreciate that.

I did. I did. It was good. And then I like. Can I, so seriously, can I be honest? My first reaction is, as a narcissist, wow, it's about me. This is awesome. I hope everyone I know from high school sees it.

Yeah. And then, you know what? I start, I've actually become, and I'm sincere about this, a little bit uncomfortable. And I'm like, this is so clear how this ends. I'm just going to fall so fucking hard. Yeah. Oh, my God. Probably.

No, maybe not. No, I don't think so. As long as we keep producing great content, Scott, which is entirely within your ability. I think the issue is you have a love-hate relationship. You love the attention and you also hate it. And so it's difficult. But you love it. So don't like people, but I'm desperate for their affirmation. That's my demon. I'm so glad we started off talking about me because there's nothing going on in the news. No, there's so much. There's nothing going on in the news. Let's go through it.

There's so much going on, speaking of things that are happening. Twitter is testing a new audio feature called Twitter Voice. I have access to it. I made a Twitter voice, a choice, do we call it a choice, that allows certain users to share 140-second audio, which is very long, FYI, clips in the tweet. Twitter's move to get into the audio podcasting craze. I did one saying thanks for giving Donald Trump this tool now. It's an interesting thing.

They haven't done a lot of innovative things, Twitter, so that was interesting. I don't know if you have the access to it like the important people on Twitter do, but me and Cardi B and people like that. Hey, I got to use the Apple credit card early just because I know you. That's because I called them. And also, people send us shit all the time. But anyways, Twitter, I heard that there's product. It's a little innovative. It's innovative. Yeah, go ahead.

Yeah, it's innovative-ish. I heard it was supposed to take 12 months, but it took 24 because they have a part-time CEO. But anyways, see what I did there? See what I did there? Yeah, I see what you did. But I wonder what you think about it. Do you think it's a good thing? I thought it was kind of fun.

I think it's kind of fun. If people don't go to two minutes, I see what you did. But I wonder what you think about it. Do you think it's a good thing? I thought it was kind of fun. I think it's kind of fun. If people don't go to two minutes. I think it's fantastic. And I think that this times 50 is where Twitter would be if it had a full-time CEO and a management team that wasn't a revolving door. Twitter has an outstanding platform. It commands a much bigger space than it occupies or occupies a bigger space than it commands. Their innovation has been absolutely anemic. Absolutely anemic. And this is a great idea. And there should be about a dozen, there should be one of these every two weeks. Yeah, I agree. It was like, oh,

delightful. It was like, oh, delightful. And you wonder where it's going to go. I was trying to think because I felt like two and a half minutes is a long time and that people won't be listening to them. But then I was trying to think of what we could do with it, like what things you and I could do, what we could put up, put parts of our show. Like it's a marketing opportunity. It's a fun opportunity. Comics, for example. Just all kinds. I thought of all kinds of things.

And then I thought of all kinds of horrible things. And I did my first twice was about Donald Trump getting a hold of this, being crazy and saying crazy things, you know, directly to people. Yeah, but he – everyone has their medium. And one of the things I tell my kids when I say kids, students to do is to figure out what is your medium and also to avoid what mediums you're bad in. Donald Trump is not an eloquent person. And when you hear him in audio, he just sounds ridiculous. Yeah, which is why Sarah Cooper says successful. He's very good on Twitter.

Yeah. Yeah. 100%. Yeah, that, 100%. You see how bad he is. Yeah, good point. What it comes right down to is what they decide to do with the algorithm. For a while, Twitter and Facebook were very much promoting video, but an individual I work with who's smarter than me about this stuff says, do these videos for Twitter, but make sure they're less than two minutes and 20 seconds because the algorithm doesn't like long-form video. It likes short-form. So it's really up to Twitter. Twitter can promote the heck out of this product if they want. It's all about what the algorithm decides is innovative or isn't innovative. I was thinking it should be longer.

Why couldn't we put the whole podcast up there? I got all kinds of ideas in the middle of the night last night, like what we could do with it and what could be fun. It's, you know, like the same thing with TikTok. I've been really exploring TikTok. Anyway, I thought it was good for Twitter. You're right. They should do one of these a week. You're right, 100%. In a more serious topic, these issues continue around racism and problems with diversity. Pinterest, earliest week, two Black women who held leadership roles on the company's policy team, Effie Ozama and Erika Shimizu Banks, said they experienced racial discrimination, unequal pay, and a hostile work culture.

Pinterest originally found no wrongdoing by the company when they complained, but later said they will commit to a non-white board member by the end of the year. company when they complained, but later said they will commit to a non-white board member by the end of the year. It seems, I just, that's not really how it, I just, I don't even understand that as a response, although that's great. Then PepsiCo, another big brand, they sunsetted a racial stereotype, racist stereotype, this time from PepsiCo, who will be retiring Aunt Jemima. I didn't even know Aunt Jemima was still around. I didn't even know that was still around. We'll have Beth Ford, CEO of Land O'Lakes, on the

show next week to discuss why the company removed their branding of a Native American woman on their label back in February, which she did just on her own as a CEO and took a lot of guff. But then, you know, people got used to it. And the land and the lakes are still there, as someone said on Twitter. So this is just rolling through all kinds of companies and everything else, as everybody has their moment of reckoning. What do you think about them doing this? I think Uncle Ben's is another one,

which is another. I didn't know it still existed. So if you're a company, you just move in here and get them done. My thing is, why didn't they do it before when it was the right thing to do, like Beth Ford did at Land O'Lakes? Long time coming, very late. How do you look at these moves by these companies? It's really, I think there's so many interesting things taking place.

And that is typically crises are a function of anger or upset by your customer base. People get, say, you know, your supply chain is unethical. There are people making less than minimum wage in Vietnam. And then you hire Edelman, and you get Wyden Kennedy to come up with a communications plan, and you address it, and it's about communications to the external stakeholders. What's interesting about this so far is it's not as much the external stakeholders getting very angry, but your internal stakeholders, specifically your employees. So it's not about running a 60 second spot during the Masked Singer. It's about, okay, we have to, and this is good, we have to affect actual change and we have to communicate that internally.

I also think just as with the brand age, you could communicate and come up with a tangible association. Some people would just call it bullshit and wrap it around a mediocre product. Companies are used to coming up with the right themes, saying Black Lives Matter on Serifif font on a well-produced black square on instagram and thinking that'll work and now with the introduction of google such that people no longer had to defer to the brand but actually found out what that hotel was like how good that car was or wasn't actions are speaking louder than words here and that is people want actual actions and i think there is productive things taking place. 600 black managers signed an open letter to the management of WPP about what were specific changes that needed to happen. And WPP is committed to it. I would argue that as actual change.

The other thing that's sort of interesting here, and I now see COVID-19 as a metaphor for everything, is that initially COVID-19 struck what you would call the most progressive areas. Not because they're progressive, but because there were cities that had a lot of interaction. Populated. Populated. With international destinations where the virus originated. They were dense. And now it's spreading to more conservative rural states. And what's interesting about this controversy or this issue is that it seems to be hitting companies I would describe loosely as pretty progressive because the people within

the company are progressive and they're outraged and they're upset and they want to see change. Whereas more conservative companies where I would argue there may be a bigger problem don't seem to be having this internal strife. So it's starting, I mean, I know a lot of people at Pinterest, I know you do, I wouldn't describe it. I would describe Pinterest, I know that they need to make progress. I'm sure there's a lot of issues there, but I wouldn't describe, you know, it's not, it's not, I'm trying to think of a very conservative, it's not In-N-Out Burger or Chick-fil-A. It's not a conservative organization that is, it's not the old South, the Pinterest. Yeah, but I would argue that it doesn't have to

be like that because what they do is they constantly pat themselves on the back for their openness and everything else, and then they don't do anything. So, in lots of ways, what's the difference? And I think a lot of people of color and women who work there, or any what you would consider a marginalized community, which really aren't marginalized, are made to be gaslit. I've heard so many stories there, you know, and we had covered the Ellen Powell thing. It's the same story over and over again. Describe what you mean by that, made to be gaslit.

What's an example of that? Oh, it's so nice here. Oh, you're complaining. Something must be wrong with you. You know what I mean? And I think a lot of people I talk to. We're better than most, shut up. Yeah. Slack, others. There's so many people I talk to who then either speak up or just leave is that they'll get people in there and then they don't do the mentoring and the training

necessary to keep them or the way the system is, it doesn't hold people there. And so it's just, it's sort of more insidious because you are made to feel that it's your fault when it's not. And so I don't recommend either methodology, you know, very overt racism that occurs all over the place continually and this. And so I think that they're always surprised. And then they turn towards unconscious bias. And then the numbers are the same. And you're like, this is happening for a reason. And it's not because you're better, you pack of white men. It's not because you're better.

Like, that's like, I think in the back of their heads, they think that's why they're 70. I mean, I don't know. I just, they just are constantly sort of in this move into a fascinating, just like the Mark Zuckerberg video last week with his wife. It was they suddenly became aggrieved, right, when they have their hands on the reins of power. And you're like, you're aggrieved? You don't get to be aggrieved.

You caused this. And so that's a rant. But they move into victimhood really quickly. But very important that these things happen. I just, I can't believe they're still there. The same thing with the Redskins. There's all kinds of things, the Washington Redskins. Just stop.

But if you were advising Pinterest, what would you advise them to do? You know Ben Silberman. What would you advise them to do? I do. I have talked to him about this a dozen times. I mean, I just, I had heard lots of these kind of, especially from women there. I just, I think they're just, I don't know. And he happens to be a particularly earnest character compared to a lot of them and is not someone who resists a lot and like he will listen just like Brian Chesky is similar. Maybe they're just, you know, just ignoring me and thinking of their grocery list in their heads when I talk to

them about stuff like this. But they seem more cooperative or open to it. You know, we're trying this and that. It's a problem. It's slow. The pipeline, like, I don't know. I just would like to, we will fix it and by next year we'll have a better number and here's how we're going to do it would be a welcome response. It's often, it's very complex. So, tangible change around number. Yeah. Tangible commitments to the number of non-whites on the board, senior management roles. Right.

Well, they seem to want to add one person of color to the board. And I'm like, why didn't you do it before? Why didn't you examine? It's literally like the same thing. Well, yeah, but you got to start sometime. I mean, you can always say, why didn't you do it before, right? The Myanmar stuff. I was like, don't you want to know how it happened? Rather than to, like, they don't have any interest in understanding how

it got, how they got that many board members of the same kind. Again, it's not overt that you can say, you're just a racist. It's not like that. It's so you get lost in this. It's like fighting a pillow. Like, I don't know how to explain it. It's really hard to, and somehow you become a pain in the ass or you're mean. I'm always known as mean. And I don't think I'm particularly mean, but maybe I am. Anyway, but let's get to a big story. Another big story. news situation out there, just so you know. The Department of Justice sent out a 25-page recommendation to lawmakers on rolling back Section 230. As a reminder to our listeners, which we talked about last week, Mike Masnick was fantastic, Section 230 is a law that protects platforms from legal accountability for the content that appears across their properties. In a recommendation released on Wednesday, the DOJ asked lawmakers to repeal parts of the law

that has given sites immunity from lawsuits for speech posted on their platforms. So, for example, if the recommendation is taken up by Congress, users could sue companies in cases that involve child sexual abuse, terrorism, and cyber-stalking. This move comes after President Trump announced an executive order to roll back some of the protections afforded these companies under Section 230. So, again, Bill Barr, the water carrier of all time, I think that's what it is.

What do you think, Scott? Well, I think it's more reason why there should be so much more energy focused on getting young people to vote. Because if this administration has demonstrated anything, it's that our elected officials have more power than our institutions, which are supposed to slow down our elected officials when they start trying to overrun standard. This is supposed to be the domain of the FCC and people much smarter than these individuals who don't have the domain expertise or a lifetime in communications or law. And if you see what's going on, I think it all directs kind of reverse engineers back to the saying, and that is voting has incredible power because our elected officials are now deciding to become the FCC, like these

bad versions of the FCC. These guys, I would like to see Donald Trump explain what 230 is. Our guest, what was the individual's name? Mike? Mike Masnick. I thought I knew what 230 was until I spoke to Mike, and I realized I don't really understand 230. So the notion, all they see it as, they want to employ their political machinery of intimidation and delay and obfuscation and saying, basically saying to media companies, if you don't sign up and become part of, you know, if you don't become state media, I'm going to use all of these institutions

to try and punish you, that I can do that. And it's just, Bill Barr and Donald Trump have no business talking about 230. This isn't even a Department of Justice issue. It's an FCC issue. So I don't, it all reverse engineers back to, okay, what do we do about it? We vote. I hope a lot of the rage and upset out there gets translated at the voter booth this November, because our elected officials, our democracy is actually working too well. The demo and democracy is the problem, and that is elected officials can overrun our institutions that have stood there for decades or even centuries. Well, yeah, they just haven't. It's really interesting when they really haven't done it as much as you would think they could.

And I think one of the things is that they, you know, in this case, as what I've been saying, is I'm glad, I guess, Facebook and the others have lobbyists to stop this kind of thing, but then it prevents real legislation from happening. So the reason why I find this so ham-handed by Bill Barr and others is because it negates the ability to create real legislation because it's sort of dirtying up the pond here so that internet companies can point to this kind of behavior and then not really be liable for the things they deserve to be liable for. So you can't do intelligent legislation in a slow process that, you know, as much as people complain about Washington and laws and states, slow process always ends up with, can end up with better

legislation. Not always, of course, but this sort of by fiat stuff that Trump is pulling. And again, it's the last desperate grabs of this guy who seems every day to do something crazier. Okay, Kara, we're going to take a break. When we get back, we're going to talk about Hay.com,

the email startup that's having issues with Apple, the monopoly Apple. Apple monopoly, a monopoly, aopoly. We'll be right back. Fox Creative. This is advertiser content from Zelle. When you picture an online scammer, what do you see? For the longest time, we have these images of somebody sitting crouched over their computer with a hoodie on, just kind of typing away in the middle of the night. And honestly, that's not what it is anymore. That's Ian Mitchell, a banker turned fraud fighter.

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why we built HubSpot. It's an AI-powered customer platform that builds campaigns for you, tells you which leads are worth knowing, and makes writing blogs, creating videos, and posting on social a breeze. So now it's easier than ever to be a marketer. Get started at HubSpot.com slash marketers. than ever to be a marketer. Get started at HubSpot.com slash marketers. Okay, Scott, we're back. Let's talk about Basecamp's new email service, Hey.com. They're claiming Apple is abusing their power against them in the App Store. Hey.com is a new email service that helps sort through email clutter. It is an ambitious attempt to dethrone Gmail and other big email providers. It was launched earlier this week. I had the CEO of Basecamp on the show, on the Recode Decode, talking about it. But Apple has threatened to remove them from the App Store if the company

does not start offering in-app subscriptions and sharing a cut of the service's revenue. David Heinemeier-Hansen is the CTO of Basecamp. He went crazy on Twitter calling Apple gangsters, mafiosos, and things like that. I'm writing a column this week for The Times about it. He claims Apple is rejecting a bug-faced update and that Apple has asked the company in a phone call to commit adding an in-app subscription to prevent it from being removed, which is one of their rules, one of their guidelines. Meanwhile, the European Union has opened antitrust investigations against Apple's App Store and Apple Pay practices. This is, I think, a big deal, and especially because it puts attention on a company that doesn't get as much attention for bullying. But in this case, you know, Apple's saying these are our rules and you know it.

bullying. But in this case, you know, Apple's saying these are our rules and you know it. And in the case of someone like Basecamp, which is very typical of a lot of developers, they're finally speaking up saying we don't like your rules and the way you administer them and the exceptions you make. So, you know, you were talking about this and even Facebook is fighting with Apple over bringing a gaming app to the store. And that's a different story. But what do you think will happen here, Scott? This is not a good look for Apple, I think. Yeah, Apple's largely managed to stay out of the fray. And that is, it's not obvious how you would break them up. Tim Cook has been very elegant in his privacy as a basic human right. He's more likable. They're not seen as, because they're not in the

business of data and they get most of their margin or most of their dollars from margin on tech products as opposed to violating your privacy with data. They've largely stayed out of the fray and have done a really good job starching their hat white. But there's just no getting around it. The App Store is a monopoly. If you look at just a streaming video. Well, it's a duopoly. It's Google and that. It's two toll just the streaming video. Well, it's a duopoly. It's Google and that. It's two toll booths, essentially.

That's it. Yeah. But if you look at the amount of revenue, if you look at where it's going, I agree it's a duopoly, but Apple's the lead dog. Even if you look at the streaming video platforms, somewhere between 3% and 15% of the total revenue that goes to these guys doesn't go to them. It goes to Apple because all of their apps have to be downloaded through Apple. And Apple makes it very hard. Apple owns the rails. And it's a perfect example of a company that's become a utility and needs to be regulated around apps. So it's not antitrust, it's regulation. But the app store should absolutely be subject to

the kind of scrutiny. How does Spotify ever compete with their superior product, Apple Music, when they have to pay a 30% tax to Apple? You can't compete against a product that Apple then launches and has a 30% price advantage because they own the rails and you have to pay a 30% tax to get to the end consumer. So good for them. They built an ecosystem, but it should absolutely be regulated. Well, it's going to be interesting. Let me just read something from Walt Mossberg, actually, my old partner, that he just tweeted. Walt, I'm not weighing in on a growing controversy about the complex rules applied to developers in Apple's App Store, just based on what I've read. I wouldn't be surprised if Apple is forced to change some of them, but I want to make three points that people seem to forget. First, in free markets, any merchant is free to receive a fee or share of a price of the goods it distributes to consumers. This is not a tax. You're free to think 30% is too much to sell your app on the phone with about 10% global share, but it's not a tax. Second, there's history to this. Before the App Store, carriers controlled which apps could make

it onto phones and often took most of the revenue, 50, 70% and more. I was there when Steve Jobs announced that Apple would only take 30% and a room full of developers cheered. Third, even if some of the rules are judged illegal or unfair, I personally value Apple's tight control of third-party distribution as a guard against most malware and a protection of privacy. I favor curation, and then others like John Gruber were like, this is ridiculous. Apple's excuses for around hay, for example, whether it's a consumer app versus a business app is specious. So it's a really, it's going to be a really interesting debate.

And you're right. Things are going to change. There's going to be some kind of regulation here. And I think Apple should probably step forward and get ahead of it themselves, as you often say. Well, there's often, I think Walt's points are good. There are benefits to scale. Some of the things you talked about, and that is having uniform standards around malware or bad players. There are benefits to scale. Sometimes it makes

sense to have a monopoly or duopoly in a given market or in a given business. And when it does make sense, you regulate their pricing. And so this might be a perfect example of a company where there's benefits of scale to having one or two places where you get apps, but they should absolutely, in terms of their pricing and their, I mean, if Spotify is growing, is not growing as fast as Apple Music,

it means there's trouble in Mudville. And it's very simple. If they have to start 30% down in terms of their ability to reinvest capital in marketing or the product, then Apple Music with an inferior product is going to win. And they don't want to be forced to sign up subscribers via the app because of this. I think it moves from 15% to 30% depending on the year and different things like that, but it's still onerous. I mean, even, you know, one of the people from Hey.com, the founders, was pointing out that credit card companies only charge 1.8 and they find that onerous, right? Percent. And so this is a, you know, they can't

make this a business. They've spent millions on creating it and they can't compete. And one of the quotes he said, besides calling them gangsters and mafiosos, was, you know, we thought we were fighting the Gmail monopoly, but really we're fighting these heavies too. And so I think you'll find the column interesting, but it's a really, it's, you know, and Apple has its argument to make about, you know, keeping standards and people knew the rules and this and that, but I don't think they can deny there's only two tollbooths in the mobile world and they belong to Apple and Google. So it's something they're going to have to face 100%. So Scott, you do think they're going to change, Apple is going to change, and you think they'll be forced upon them or what? What would you imagine if you were

sitting next to Tim Cook? What would you advise him? So ground zero for this type of regulation is the App Store or store, specifically Apple and Android, there are benefits to scale, as Walt pointed out. There are benefits to, you know, they have earned their place in the world. But when you get to a point where, you know, it makes sense for Florida Power & Light to be the primary provider of electricity generation and distribution. But when you get to a point where you either turn on your lights or you don't, which means being a customer of FPL, it requires regulations such that you don't have useless pricing and anti-competitive dynamics, both of which we have here with the

App Store. So this absolutely should be subject to really thoughtful non-bar, non-Trump scrutiny around regulation. So, the other three guys, you know, I think the solution is antitrust and breaking them up. Apple, you can't break up because who would have domain over their key asset, which is the brand, but it is ground zero for regulation is the app store. Right, and also to make the app store safe and to have standard. I mean, look, Google's one big Wild West situation. And one of the other questions I have for you is, okay, if they do this, it's become a substantive amount of their revenue, the service revenues. It was $519 billion in overall sales of which Apple gets a part of that. So they've also created a very lucrative platform for developers.

And at the same time, developers feel like they're taking too much of the toll. So to me, I think there's no good toll booth in the end, but does there have to be? So what do you do when it's that much money for everybody, including Apple? Well, it just might, Apple might, may lose some revenue here, or they may not. I mean, a couple of things might happen. One, they might be prohibited from entering certain businesses where owning the rails gives them such an unfair advantage. You know, no one initially thought Apple would be in streaming music. Yeah, yeah. But when they enter streaming music and they can place a 30% tax on the market leader and they start gaining share again with an inferior product, it shows, it demonstrates the problem. So I don't, you know, it's great to be a monopoly, but the fact that you are garnering an unfair share of revenues because of your monopoly abuse doesn't mean that you're entitled to hold onto that revenue. So there, yeah, it might hit them hard. I think the biggest thing that dictates Apple stock price right now is the percentage of revenue they get from recurring revenue.

revenue they get from recurring revenue. The revenue is EBITDA, but the multiple on EBITDA is the percentage you're getting from recurring revenue, which is now up to 23%. And we've seen a recasting of their stock where it's gone from a PE of 12 to 24. So I actually think that's more important. But yeah, the app stores should absolutely be looked at and, in my opinion, probably be regulated. Yeah, I think they're not going to outrun this. And it'll be interesting to see how they do it. And I think when developers like Basecamp, which is a very popular column is, help us, Congress. We have no hope. It felt like very Star Wars-ian. Anyway, it'll be interesting, and it'll be interesting to see what Apple does. But don't you want to describe, but just as an example, don't you want, I was really interested, as I thought about it, to try, hey, I thought, wow,

email really has, I don't know what I don't know. Yeah. Oh, you use it. Yeah, I use it. And what do you think of it? I think it's great. I'm still working with it. It's got some bugs. Actually, they couldn't fix some bugs, like photos loading up and stuff like that. I think email, you know, Brian Chen did an excellent review in the New York Times about this. It's got a lot of issues,

did an excellent review in the New York Times about this. It's got a lot of issues, but at the same time, the idea of trying to fix email, he thinks you can't fix email eventually. It's impossible. It's a war that you could never win. And that people have moved on to other messaging platforms. I am always searching for that silver bullet to kill email in a way that is not, I hate email, as you know. But I am going to try it. I think it's very innovative, and I like any. There's been lots of email apps, but Google continues to control and dominate

and honestly spy on you during it. I don't want to use all the Gmail iterations, and I'd like there to be a more vibrant ability for others to do it. I don't know if email is the hill I would die on necessarily, because I do think I'd like to get rid of email completely. But it just sits there. Read the Brian Chen review. I thought it was quite fair, and I think so did Basecamp.

But you should try it. It's fun. And there's a thing called Inbox, I-M-B-O-X, instead of inbox. Inbox. Anyway, I like it. You should try it. It's fun. That's a big innovation, Inbox. Anyway, I like it. You should try it. It's fun. That's the big innovation, inbox?

No, no, no, no. There's a lot of little innovations, like pinning certain things, putting a file where your bills go, saving things for later. It's just instead of having to star them and all these, there's no innovation in email by Apple or Google or anybody. And it's nice to see innovation. So I think that's great. So anyway, anyway, we're going to take one more quick break. We'll be back for predictions. Support for this podcast comes from Anthropic. You already know that AI is transforming the world around us, but lost in all the enthusiasm and excitement is a really important question.

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approach, what learnings have shifted their career trajectories, and how do they find their next great idea? Invest 30 minutes in an episode today. Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. Published by Capital Client Group, Inc. Okay, Scott, we've been making predictions about the next class of IPOs. It's been a strong one. We saw the stock market make some big gains this week. There was a story in the journal about this, the tech you sent me. What can we expect in the coming weeks?

It looks like the market, as Susie Orman said, the market is not the economy. The economy is not the market, but the market rolls on. Well, this is an observation and a prediction. I think there's this incredible phenomena of the young male brain is especially risk aggressive and gets a lot of reward from taking risks. And one of the ways that manifests itself is in gambling. And gambling addiction is actually, I believe, the addiction that has the highest suicide rate because you can get into a lot of trouble without people knowing. There can be no external signals that you're in trouble. If you're a raging alcoholic, the people around you know it

and will hopefully intervene. But you can lose everything with a gambling addiction before anyone even notices it. And so anyways, that goes to my prediction, just as I think we're going to find out over time that Instagram has been the direct cause and also the concerted effort of the folks at Instagram to make it addictive has resulted in a lot of the skyrocketing levels of self-harm and suicide among teen girls. I think we have the same unfortunate forces at play here with online trading. And I'm hoping that the CEO of Robinhood really took pause. There was a young man, a 20-year-old. This kid named Alex Kearns committed suicide, this 20-year-old, in Naperville. And they found on his phone, the last thing on his phone was it said he was, it registered

that he was down 700 grand in his trading app, his Robinhood app. And so you're seeing just a ton of young men trading. And then these apps, you know, there's zero commission, encourage margin, encourage leverage. And then these kids basically feel like there's no way out. Yeah. Anyways, my prediction is I think these online trading apps are going to be kind of the new. It's interesting, Scott. This is something that means a lot to you.

Well, if you have sons, you think like, Jesus Christ. The parents had no idea. The parents had no idea. The parents had no idea. Yeah. And it feels, it has echoes of Instagram and the impact it's having on our girls and our young women. And I wonder if there's this same very unhealthy, very unhealthy addictive-like qualities that these companies try and build into their apps. Well, 100%. That is going to result in the type of damage.

I'm curious because you were around for the last online trading boom when people were losing money and when E-Trade and all the others, Ameritrade, and everyone was at home being their own. And people got in a lot of trouble doing it for the first time when they didn't remove a lot of the things. Now, on one hand, it's great that you don't need to pay broker's fees and this and that and be, you know, sort of speaking of taxes. How does that compare from your perspective? Is it different because it's a mobile app? It feels even more like gambling?

Because that was, I recall. Oh, go on Robinhood. They have confetti. They have confetti. They've gamified it. They've clearly taken notes from gambling in terms of random rewards, a series of unexpected and random opportunities, visuals, colorization, gamification, also offering leverage and things like pulled put option techniques to young people who have no background in investing, there is something very ugly going on here. Have you thought about investing in this, or how do you feel as an investor? We had this discussion about Juul.

We had this discussion about Juul, the same thing, the whole idea. companies, a company called Public, and the thing I like about Public is that it is not letting kids trade on leverage. It's not allowing certain types of options. It's trying to foot to, and let me be clear, there's some wonderful things about these apps to get young people interested in investing at a young age, to give them the opportunity to invest at a young age, to get them the ability to buy micro shares is an interesting thing. I think zero commissions is an interesting thing. So there's a lot of good that can come from this, just as there's a lot of good that can come from social media. The problem is in order to scale and make money, you start going after the addictive side of the brain and you give them the opportunities to get into trouble.

And there's no, I worry that the algorithms move the brain to a very ugly place where people feel they have no way out. Same difference as social media. As evidenced by this young man's suicide. Yeah. So you would imagine regulation coming. Online trading is becoming the new Instagram. Yeah, so regulation's headed this way.

I don't know. I don't know what's, or lawsuits. They don't have the same protection as the media companies. They don't have 230, so we'll media companies. They don't have 230. So we'll see. Yeah, I think they will. I think there'll be. What do you think is going to happen?

I think there were lawsuits last time. So long ago when this was happening and it was a phenomenon. I think there will be. I think just like with Juul, you know, I remember meeting the Juul people very early and they're like all up and to the right. And I was like, it's still cigarettes. I just don't see how you're going to avoid cigarette issues in the way you advertise to young people. And the same thing here. I think once they start sort of preying on especially young people, and they'll have those statistics and demographics with all kinds of gamification of this, this is perfect for regulators.

It feels predatory. It feels something. So this so this is, this is like, you can see a state's attorney general going after this kind of stuff really quickly. It reminds me of the same, the same, like if we can take advantage of people, we will. And I agree with you. There's some great parts of kids learning how to, how to invest, but it is, you know, what Susie was talking about last week. So I think this is a great prediction. So I think this is a great thing to talk about, but IPOs in general, do you have any? Like they're coming, right? The big ones are coming.

You see no stoppage. Yeah, the one I'm trying to get in on, I don't like to give investment advice anymore. I just talk about what I'm trying to do. So I'm trying to vote with my feet. I'll likely be investing in the IPO of Lemonade only because, not only because, A, I think the CEO, they're smart. I heard his interview with you. He strikes me as a very, very thoughtful, bright guy. Also, I think shareholder value creation is not only a function of the execution and the quality of the management team, but also the size of the opportunity for disruption. And when I think about one of the few industries that really has

tens of billions of dollars of margin they don't deserve, I zero in on insurance. And so I think, and I'm hoping, assuming I can get stock at a reasonable rate, I think the IPO of Lemonade might be the best performing stock of the quarter or it's registered the biggest pop. I guess it's dependent on how they price it. But Lemonade, a disruptor in the highly disruptable business of insurance could be just a monster. Smart guy. I really enjoy it. Think about how much money they're spending on TV.

I agree. Agreed. Agreed. Agreed. And insurance is such a problem. Do you have any predictions, Kara? No, I don't. I never do.

I let you have them. And then you go out on the limb, and then sometimes it gets sawed off, and sometimes it doesn't. So, I like to just watch as you do that, as you perform your high wire act, Scott. I don't like when I see tweets like, you got this wrong. I don't know what's going to happen. All I do know is that... What? The key isn't what? Give me a tip on predictions. The key isn't to be right. It's to catalyze a conversation.

Fair. Okay. I'll catalyze a conversation. People of Silicon Valley, as I've said a million times, you have to stop doing these band-aid approaches to things like racism and diversity and actually do some actual actions to get to the root of the problem.

You have to do this. It's not just a moral imperative, it's a business imperative. And the more you don't do it, the more I find you to be just like every other shitty capitalist that exists. So if you want to rise high, try harder. That's what I say. Thank you. All right, there you go. How's that?

How's that? Or is that just a lecture? Was that predictions or indignant self-righteous rants? Yes, that's what it was. Which part of the show are we in right now? You know what? I'm right, though. I'm on the right side of history.

And you know, you don't have to listen to me. You know, but I'm right. No, but here's the thing. But I'm right. You do not have to go to dinner. The new book from Kara Swisher, But I'm Right. I have a book. I'm writing a book.

You're going to be in it. And it's going to be a tell-all about your FOMER and other issues we have. I can't wait. Unfortunately, there's not a lot at all to tell here. But anyways. There'll be new headlines about Scott Galloway and not just that he's the king of all media. Oh, my God. I literally want to.

I'm the whore of all media. It's not that my media is that good. It's just I say yes to everything. Why didn't it say the whore of all media? I say yes to everything. Why did not it say the whore of all media? It should have. That was a tongue bath.

It should have said the whore of all media. Literally, all the men have man crushes on you. It's a tongue bath, like, continually. It's fascinating. I'm just saying it's fascinating. Anyway, there's not going to be a backlash against you, Scott. Not yet, at least. Anyway, do you have any plans for the weekend?

We got to go. We got to go. Do you have any plans for the weekend? Florida's having the COVID situation. I'm trying to get my mother out of there before she wanders her way into COVID. Yeah, more infections, more record number of infections in Florida. Yeah. No, we're sheltering in place and, you know, time with my boys and all that good stuff.

How about you? Are you not putting the kids out to the lawn anymore? You finally figured out a way to get along together? We, you know, we're having a great time. We've been watching, actually, The Wonder Years. Oh, wow. Oh, I love that. Fred Savage.

Oh, it's wonderful. Wonderful. And the way I bond with my 12-year-old is everyone goes to sleep, and then he sneaks downstairs, and we watch Killing Eve together. So inappropriate. Which one do you watch? So inappropriate. What do you watch?

Killing Eve. Oh, don't do that. Killing Eve. What is wrong with you? Oh, yeah. He loves it. He loves it. I am going to do an intervention with the Florida government soon, very soon.

So don't just answer the knock at the door. What are you doing this weekend, Kara? I'm in Vermont. It's lovely here. It's lovely here. And I will be bicycling and dealing with... I don't... The only thing...

I love it here. It's quite beautiful. But the bugs... I don't like bugs. And I like to work. I don't... I'm not a vacationer, Scott. I'm just not... I love it here. It's quite beautiful, but the bugs, I don't like bugs. And I like to work. I'm not a vacationer, Scott. I'm just not. I like to work. I like the big city. But it's beautiful here. Amanda's parents have a beautiful

house, and it's lovely. It's lovely, nature-y, and very pretty. So I think there will be maple syrup in my future at some point here. Anyway, don't forget, if there's a story in the news and you're curious about and want to hear our opinion on, email us at pivotedboxmedia.com to be featured on the show. Scott, please read us out. Today's show was produced by Rebecca Sinanis. Fernando Finete engineered this episode. Erica Anderson is Pivot's executive producer. Thanks also to Drew Burrows. Make sure you subscribe

to the show on Apple Podcasts, or if you're an Android user, check us out on Spotify. Or wherever you listen to podcasts. If you liked our show, please recommend it to a friend. Thanks for listening to Pivot from Vox Media. We'll be back next week for another breakdown of all things tech and business. We'll see you next time. into real-time connections across AI-powered email, SMS, and more, making every moment count. Over 100,000 brands trust Klaviyo's unified data and marketing platform to build smarter digital relationships with their customers

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