The Philip DeFranco Show - PDS 1.25 Why The Internet is Freaking Out On Billie Eilish Taylor Swift, Joe Rogan, Youtube Embraces NFTs & More

Episode Date: January 25, 2022

Go to http://www.getroman.com/Phil for $15 off your first ED treatment + free two-day shipping if prescribed News You Might Have Missed: https://youtu.be/QEHbOu7aY_k TEXT ME! [phone] Get More Phil: https://linktr.ee/PhilipDeFranco – 00:00 - Mark Cuban Launches Online Pharmacy to Cut Generic Drug Prices 02:40 - Susan Wojcicki Talks NFTs, Dislike Button 06:09 - Biden Caught on Hot Mic Slamming Peter Doocy 08:47 - Sponsor 09:36 - Neil Young Demands His Music Be Taken Down From Spotify Over Misinformation 11:33 - Taylor Swift Calls Out Damon Albarn For Saying She Doesn’t Write Her Own Music 13:38 - Federal Court Throws Out Alabama Congressional Map, Citing Its Effect on Black Voters – ✩ TODAY’S STORIES ✩ Mark Cuban Launches Online Pharmacy to Cut Generic Drug Prices: https://www.npr.org/2022/01/24/1075344246/mark-cuban-pharmacy Susan Wojcicki Talks NFTs, Dislike Button: https://blog.youtube/inside-youtube/letter-susan-our-2022-priorities/ Biden Caught on Hot Mic Slamming Peter Doocy: https://www.axios.com/biden-reporter-blast-inflation-d3b832f1-6170-4f31-a34c-8229f1cb9ec5.html Neil Young Demands His Music Be Taken Down From Spotify Over Misinformation: https://roguerocket.com/2022/01/25/neil-young-spotify-rogan/ Taylor Swift Slams Damon Albarn For Saying She Doesn’t Write Her Own Music: https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/music/story/2022-01-24/taylor-swift-damon-albarn-interview-tweet-songs Federal Court Throws Out Alabama Congressional Map, Citing Its Effect on Black Voters: https://roguerocket.com/2022/01/25/alabama-congressional-map-gerrymandering/ —————————— Executive Producer: Amanda Morones Produced by: Cory Ray Edited by: James Girardier, Julie Goldberg, Maxwell Enright Art Department: Brian Borst, William Crespo Writing/Research: Philip DeFranco, Brian Espinoza, Maddie Crichton, Lili Stenn, Ben Wheeler Production Team: Zack Taylor, Emma Leid ———————————— #DeFranco #BillieEilish #JoeRogan ———————————— Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sup you beautiful bastards, welcome back to the Show it is Tuesday and let's just jump into it. Hey y'all first up today I have to ask you what is more American than having a billionaire attempt to fix an issue that many have been asking the government To deal with for decades and obviously yeah, I'm being a little inflammatory there But Mark Cuban right now is aiming to do just that and he may be able to do it So last Wednesday, he announced that he was starting an online pharmacy called the Mark Cuban Cost Plus Drug Company, or MCC PDC, with a homepage reading,

"'No middlemen, no price games, huge drug savings.'" Okay, what is the game plan? Well, MCC PDC will offer generic versions of drugs at cost plus just a small fee and markup. And in most cases, it's expected that it will end up being substantially cheaper that way. For example, a 30-day supply of atorvastatin, the generic version of Lipitor costs

between 50 and a hundred plus dollars retail with insurance. But at MCC PDC, it's just $3.60 plus $5 shipping, which I mean, you don't even have to be good with numbers to see, that's huge. And that said, some have criticized this saying, they're not the only one, it's actually pretty easy to get coupons for other generics at places like goodrx.com.

But still in this case, Cuban's company is very competitive. Or the cheapest I could find this drug was for $6 at HEB and that wasn't including shipping. But keep in mind, that's just one example of one drug. I mean, the further we looked into this, we found the savings can get even crazier if you're on some sort of specialty medication like albendazole, which is used to get rid of worms.

However, there do seem to be potentially a handful of issues or at the very least, let's call them limitations. First up, I mean, you have the limited selection. Currently they only offer 100 generic drugs and are missing some pretty common ones. Things like the generic version of Benicar, which is used for high blood pressure. Also there's the issue of insurance.

MCC PDC is not accepting insurance. Although here Cuban is confident that his prices would still be lower than what many people with insurance would normally pay. But still to insert my opinion here, I think this is a fantastic start. Right, sure, it's unclear how quickly other medications will be added, but if this starts to get movement, this could impact the whole industry. Which I think this is a fantastic start. Right, sure, it's unclear how quickly other medications will be added,

but if this starts to get movement, this could impact the whole industry, which I think is part of the reason why Cuban's efforts have been generally praised, right? Everyone hates drug prices. In fact, back in December, Gallup released a poll that found that 18 million Americans could not afford at least one doctor prescribed med

over the previous three months. That is fucking insane, and if you know anyone that's on medication, or if you are on medication yourself, I'm sure you also have a story of someone that should not be doing it But out of just desperation is like trying to figure out how they can stretch a pill out over a longer period of time Even though they're not supposed to take a smaller dose

So for those reasons and so much more I'm rooting for Mark Cuban here There needs to be more competition like this because if there is none the rich fucks will just fucking try and drain the American Public for as long as they can until you're just a husk of your former self. So with this story, I mean, one, what are your general thoughts? And two, if you take the time to actually go to this site and maybe price check what your medications would cost, see what the difference is.

Is it there? Is it not? Could it be helpful? Is it not? Because hopefully at least one of those things is there and maybe your life becomes a little easier. And then let's talk about YouTube CEO, Susan Wojcicki and a little bit of controversy right now. Also this relating to the future of YouTube. So Susan put out a letter today called our 2022 priorities.

And in this letter talking about the state of the creator economy, talking about the momentum across the platform, including on Shorts, saying that Shorts have now hit 5 trillion. That's with a T all time views. Adding the number of channels around the world, making more than $10,000 a year is up 40% year over year. And then specifically regarding money and Shorts,

because it's kind of this known in the industry that money made from short form content like this, it's usually small. Susan announced that YouTube will be testing out new monetization features for its shorts creators. Things like looking into integrating merch stores into shorts, connecting shorts creators to brands through YouTube's Brand Connect.

And all that coming after the company's already established a $100 million fund that was meant to encourage creators to start using shorts. With Wojcicki saying that YouTube's shorts experiment has actually been good in bringing in new talent, revealing that upwards of 40% of those getting money from the shorts fund aren't in the partner program. But then after that, we get to the controversy.

Wojcicki stating the company hopes, quote, "'To help creators capitalize on emerging technologies, including things like NFTs.'" Now with that said, it's important to note that YouTube's not like the first big company to kind of embrace or at least dabble with NFTs. I think most companies right now are thinking about, or at least worried about what Web3 is gonna look like, what are NFTs going to look like. Some big ideas, some kind of dipping the toe, right?

Last week we saw Twitter announcing, hey, you can put your NFT as your profile image and it'll look like this and a hexagon. Well, I know a majority of this audience not a fan of NFTs. I truly believe that NFTs, maybe not with 99% of them all right now, but NFTs I think are gonna be a part of our future. Granted, that NFTs, maybe not with 99% of them all right now, but NFTs I think are going to be a part of our future. Granted, I don't think it's going to be, hey look, I bought an image for a million dollars and it has no utility. I think that's fucking stupid. Like that shit just feels like rich people taking money from other rich people and everyone's kind

of playing this game of hot potato. Things like, I mean, if they do it correctly, the Nelk Boys recently, think what you want about them, but they launched an NFT project. It's believed they made $23 million from their launch. But if the utility connected to their NFT actually like gives people exclusive access to like in real life events, clothing discounts for life or whatever, I see potential value in that for the same reason why I see potential value in,

I don't know if you saw Gary Vee. He's part of this new thing, the Fly Fish Club. It's a dining club and to get access, you have to actually have an NFT, which to me just feels like the evolution is something like the Soho house and its memberships. But instead of a place just having like a membership and then, you know, when you're done going to that place,

you just no longer have the membership, you could actually technically sell your membership or with five fly fish club, you can actually like rent it out. And so in a weird way, like early adopters of the NFT can kind of be seen almost as like investors who can profit or benefit from then other people embracing this place. Like that, it could still fail, but at least that I kind of be seen almost as like investors who can profit or benefit from then other people embracing this place.

Like that, it could still fail, but at least that I kind of understand. But still, with all that, we saw a lot of people pushing back on Wojcicki there, but it's also not the only place. We saw Susan doubling down on the company's stance towards dislikes, specifically not showing them publicly. There was extremely controversial,

a lot of negative feelings, people saying, you know, those, the dislikes, it helped me gauge whether a video was worth it or not. But according to Wojcicki, every way we looked at it, we did not see a meaningful difference in viewership, regardless of whether or not there was a public dislike count. And importantly, it reduced dislike attacks. And actually to that point, we've seen some creators

like Hank Green taking to Twitter saying, hey, I know it's an unpopular opinion, but I feel far less anxious now that there's not this public dislike count. Which, I will say, even as someone that I don't like that YouTube did this, I think Hank is actually right. I haven't been anxious about likes or dislikes since the change. Still, I don't like YouTube removing that,

but I think Hank does have a point to a degree. With all of that said, I'd love to know your thoughts on this situation and also specifically regarding NFTs. I know a large portion of this audience, they just hate it. But I do want to know, when you see more established companies like a Twitter and a YouTube kind of embracing it, dabbling,

does it add to their legitimacy or no, you think they're just testing with like a passing fad? And then of course we have to talk about the Joe Biden Fox News reporter situation, which if somehow this evaded your radar, here's the clip. Do you think inflation is political? No, it's not. It's a great asset.

Thank you. More inflation. What a stupid son of a. Okay, so not very presidential, but in President Biden's defense, wondering why Peter Doocy's asking such stupid fucking questions is a time-honored American tradition.

Your relationship with the president frayed to the point that you are not going to support anything that he comes to you and asks for. Why would you say something that stupid? Why would you ask something that dumb? But no, I mean, not joking about it. When I look to the internet and all the reactions. Why would you say something that stupid? Why would you ask something that dumb? But no, I mean, not joking about it. When I look to the internet and all the reactions I've seen, I've seen a lot of hypocrites on both sides,

though I don't wanna say equivalent hypocrites. So where I'll start is, you know, to be honest, when I first saw that clip, I audibly laughed because I just didn't expect that. Though at the same time, I don't like to see a president speaking to a member of the press like that, whether you think Ducey's a fucking moron or not. Well, I understand why a lot of Democrats were like,

ha ha, I love it. Especially after just seeing Trump between 2016 and 2020, you're like, oh, finally, our team has given you a taste of your own medicine. But it doesn't automatically make it right that Biden did this and that maybe he should do it more and become a Trumpian figure for the left. Then on the right, holy fuck,

some of like the blind hypocrisy I've seen. Are people who I saw on social media between 2016 and 2020 joking about drinking liberal tears every time Trump was just berating reporters or just somebody. Son of a off the field right now. He's a sleeping son of a. We say to Americans who are watching you right now who are scared, I say that you're a terrible reporter.

This sleazy guy right over here from ABC, he's a sleaze in my book. You're a terrible reporter. This sleazy guy right over here from ABC, he's a sleaze, my book. You're a sleaze. You know who's a criminal? You're a criminal for not reporting it. You are a criminal for not reporting it. You have people like Jim Banks straight face tweeting, have we ever seen a president attack and malign

the free press like Joe Biden has? Yeah, motherfucker, we have. Are you and the rest of these pro-clutchers, like people who were in a coma for four years between 2016 and 2020? The constant attacks from Trump and members of the press that many of these same people who were offended, rooted on, or just acted blind to.

This constant undermining of what the truth really is, which unfortunately has been very effective. And I'm so surprised that people have like, not really pointed this out. Did everyone just like collectively forget one of the staples of like all his rallies or big events was the moments where he would get the audience to essentially turn and look at and scream at members of the press.

People he labeled enemies of the people daily. Right, and then in addition to that, you have these people that are like, hey, they're both equally bad, which I personally think is a silly argument because you're comparing four years of continuous attacks from Trump and this moment from Biden. It doesn't excuse what Biden said,

but it is just, it is beyond moronic to compare the two as equals. And that is all I got to say about that. But from that, I want to take a second to thank the sponsor of today's show, Roman. Roman is a digital health platform for men that makes high quality care accessible and convenient by connecting you with a US licensed physician,

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with the link in the description. And then let's talk about the news threesome that is Neil Young, Joe Rogan and Spotify. So to start, if you don't know who Neil Young is, maybe ask your parents, also depending on your age, maybe ask your grandparents or I guess to save you time, because technically it's my job to let you know, he is a singer and he just wrote an open letter

to his management and label, demanding that his music be taken down from Spotify. And that's because he said Spotify allows vaccine misinformation to thrive on the platform, with him specifically citing Joe Rogan. Right, because like what's been widely reported before, Rogan's promoted anti-vax rhetoric on his podcast time and time again.

Well now, the letter that was posted to Young's website has been removed. According to Rolling Stone, which was the first to report on this, it said, "'I want you to let Spotify know immediately today "'that I want all my music off their platform. "'They can have Rogan or Young, not both. "'I am doing this because Spotify is spreading fake "'information about vaccines potentially causing death

"'to those who believe the disinformation "'being spread by them. "'Please act on this immediately today "'and keep me informed on the time schedule.'" With Young's manager confirming to the Daily Beast that the letter is authentic, telling the outlet, "'It's something that's really important, Anil. He's very upset about this disinformation.

We're trying to figure this out right now.'" Well, the letter was to Young's management, not Spotify directly, with people wondering, you know, are they going to do something? But there's really no reason to think that Spotify is going to do anything different than what we've been seeing for a while now. Because let's say, ideologically,

the upper people at Spotify, they don't even agree with Rogan. Maybe they're even horrified by it. I don't think that's the case, but let's say that. Spotify the upper people at Spotify, they don't even agree with Rogan. Maybe they're even horrified by it. I don't think that's the case, but let's say that. Spotify and their actions have made it clear that they are big believers and the market will decide what the market will decide. Also, they probably lean that way

because they spent a fuck ton of money to bring Joe Rogan to the platform. So if you base this just on the numbers, I mean, Young has around 6 million monthly listeners on Spotify, whereas Joe Rogan has the number one podcast on Spotify and pretty much in the world. So if they're deciding by the market and numbers, it's not exactly Sophie's choice.

But where it could potentially become an issue is if other artists see what Young did and go, yeah, I'm going to follow suit. And or if it led to fans of other big mainstream musical artists going, oh, what Young did, I didn't even realize that was an option. I'm going to tell my favorite artists they should do the same thing. But personally, I don't really see that happening to a point that moves the needle in any way. I mean, been wrong before but I don't think I'm gonna be wrong on this You know, there's that idiom money moves mountains, but also money keeps things in place, too Hey with all that said what are your thoughts on this situation? And then let's talk about this controversy with Taylor Swift and to a lesser degree Billie Eilish

The British musician Damon Alburn did an interview with the Los Angeles Times and in it he and the interviewer were discussing modern music when The interviewer brought up Taylor by saying she may not be your taste But Taylor Swift is an excellent songwriter.'" To which Damon responds, "'She doesn't write her own songs.'" The interviewer then clarifying that, "'Yes, Taylor writes or co-writes her own songs,' but Damon responded by saying,

"'That doesn't count. "'I know what co-writing is. "'Co-writing is very different to writing. "'I'm not hating on anybody. "'I'm just saying there's a big difference "'between a songwriter and a songwriter who co-writes. "'Doesn't mean that the outcome can't be really great.'" And as far as the current musician

that Damon really admires today, he said, a really interesting songwriter is Billie Eilish and her brother. I'm more attracted to that than to Taylor Swift. It's just darker, less endlessly upbeat, way more minor and odd. I think she's exceptional. And so this prompted a ton of backlash because you have people saying,

even if Taylor had a collaborator, she's still writing all her own songs. Noting tons of artists co-write, but that in no way lessens the fact that they write their own music. And in fact, sometimes Taylor does do it alone. There are songs in some of her most recent albums like Lover and Folklore she penned alone and back in 2010 when she was 20 years old she released an album called Speak Now which she wrote entirely by herself. That and you had a ton of people thinking it

made no sense that he slammed Taylor for co-writing but then went on to praise the writing of Billie Eilish and Phineas Who are both co-writing songs together. So to a lot of people this criticism from Damon was pretty unjust but then Taylor herself also responded saying, I was such a big fan of yours until I saw this. I write all of my own songs. Your hot take is completely false and so damaging. You don't have to like my songs, but it's really fucked up to try and discredit my writing. Wow. Yes, I wrote this tweet all by myself in case you were wondering. And tons of people came to Taylor's defense, including artists that she's worked with, even the president-elect of Chile. All of that then leading to Damon responding on Twitter saying,

I totally agree with you. I had a conversation about songwriting and sadly it was reduced to clickbait. I apologize unreservedly and unconditionally. The last thing I want to do is discredit your songwriting. I hope you understand. But then even that response got slammed by people who said, how is that reduced to clickbait?

Unless the interviewer is lying, you said she doesn't write her own songs directly to this reporter. So with this story, I want to know your thoughts, right? Do you think the comments or the interview itself, maybe it's being blown out of proportion? Yes, no, why, why not? And in connection to that,

what are your thoughts about kind of Damon's defense saying, you know, this has been reduced to click bait. Is that kind of this, this week walking back, he's like, oh shit, I got in trouble. Or do you see a way that this could have all kind of been misconstrued or what? And then let's talk about Alabama. Roll tide.

A panel of federal judges tossed out Alabama's new congressional map yesterday, ruling that the current version significantly weakens the voting power of black residents. In their decision, the three judges know that while nearly one out of every three Alabamians are black, the map drawn by the Republican-led legislature after the 2020 census was gerrymandered to leave just one of the state's seven districts with a black majority. With them writing, black voters have less opportunity than other Alabamians to elect candidates of their choice to Congress. We find that the plaintiffs will suffer an irreparable harm

if they must vote in the 2022 congressional elections based on a redistricting plan that violates federal law. So as a result, the judges also ordered state lawmakers to redraw their maps so that it includes two districts in which black voters either comprise a voting age majority or something quite close to it, with them giving the legislature 14 days to redo their map before they appoint a special master to do so.

But shortly after the ruling, a spokesperson for the Alabama Attorney General, Steve Marshall said in a statement that his office quote, "'strongly disagrees with the court's decision and will be appealing in the coming days.'" And according to reports, that matter could ultimately go to the Supreme Court, which would then decide whether lawmakers can draw maps

that are gerrymandered along racial lines. Now, notably here, the High Court ruled back in 2019 that the federal courts do not have the power to block congressional maps that are gerrymandered to skew districts in a partisan manner, unless a state's constitution explicitly prohibits such gerrymandering. But the justices did keep parts of the Voting Rights Act

that ban racial or ethnic gerrymandering, which the federal panel claims is the case in Alabama. So clearly a situation that's shaping up to be a major legal battle, but Alabama's congressional map isn't the only one drawn by Republicans that's been thrown out in recent weeks. Earlier this month, Ohio Supreme Court

ordered lawmakers to redraw a map that would have given Republicans 12 congressional seats and Democrats just three, despite the fact that recently the GOP had only won about 55% of the popular vote statewide. Almost a 50-50 split in a popular vote, but a split of seats 12 to three. With the state's high court ruling that the map clearly violated a constitutional amendment

overwhelmingly passed by voters in 2018 that effectively banned partisan gerrymandering. And of course, all of that is in addition to a number of other ongoing legal battles over other maps and other states. And with primaries for the midterms just around the corner, we can expect a lot of this to come to a head soon. Yeah, ultimately that is where we are

with this gerrymandering redistricting situation. And of course, with that, I wanna pass the question off to you. What are your thoughts here? Ultimately, that is where that story and today's show ends. As always, thank you for watching, liking, joining the family by subscribing. I love yo faces and I'll see you tomorrow.