Speaker 1: There Are No Girls on the Internet. As a production
Speaker 1: of iHeartRadio and Unbossed Creative, I'm bridgetat and this is
Speaker 1: there Are No Girls on the Internet. I'm here as
Speaker 1: my producer, Mike. Thanks for being.
Speaker 2: Here, Mike, thanks for having me back.
Speaker 1: Bridget And here's what you may have missed this week
Speaker 1: on the Internet. So in stuff, I absolutely fucking hate news.
Speaker 1: TikTok is a wash with AI generated true crime victim stories.
Speaker 1: So if you've been on TikTok at all, you've probably
Speaker 1: seen this new subsection of true crime content where very
Speaker 1: creepy AI generated children who speak in this like weird
Speaker 1: robotic baby voice about how they were tortured or murdered
Speaker 1: is flooding the platform. They purport to show actual murder
Speaker 1: victims telling their stories. Now, there are adult victims being depicted,
Speaker 1: including politicians and celebrities, but the ones that feature children
Speaker 1: are by far more popular and plentiful. These TikTok accounts
Speaker 1: claim to be honoring in heavy scare quotes the victims
Speaker 1: and their stories of violence, but Rolling Stone reports that
Speaker 1: they often get pretty major details wrong, which may even
Speaker 1: be an intentional attempt to get around TikTok's rules against
Speaker 1: AI generated deep fakes of famous people EXONERI. Amanda Knox,
Speaker 1: who we spoke to on There No Girls on the
Speaker 1: Internet last year, who also has a new podcast about
Speaker 1: the history of true crime called Blood Money, had a
Speaker 1: really interesting perspective that she shared on Blue Sky that
Speaker 1: even though this addition of AI is definitely creepy, this
Speaker 1: is nothing new. Amanda Knox writes, this isn't a fresh hell.
Speaker 1: There's a precedent for this dating back over four hundred years.
Speaker 1: One of the earliest forms of true crime was the
Speaker 1: printed broadside poster. These posters would tell stories of brutal murders,
Speaker 1: often murders of children, and these stories would often be
Speaker 1: told in the ballad form, a song written in the
Speaker 1: voice of either the condemned criminal or the murdered person.
Speaker 1: Whoever all these ballots which just make them all up.
Speaker 1: They would invent the pleading words of the child and
Speaker 1: the moments before they were killed, or they would convey
Speaker 1: the thoughts of the criminal as they confessed or acknowledged regret.
Speaker 1: So these creepy AI generated true crime deep fakes of
Speaker 1: children may not be a totally new phenomena, but the
Speaker 1: addition of AI to recreate these child victims definitely makes
Speaker 1: them much more creepy. Like to be able to tell
Speaker 1: an AI program to generate the likeness of a murdered
Speaker 1: child for views on social media is pretty weird if
Speaker 1: I think it represents this AI presenting the possibility for
Speaker 1: ever more expanded tech facilitated ghoulishness.
Speaker 2: Yeah, gross creepy, you know. Amanaaxa as Usual makes a
Speaker 2: pretty good point that it's not new that people have
Speaker 2: been using true crime and broadsides for you know, hundreds
Speaker 2: of years, ever since the invention of the printing press.
Speaker 2: But I guess one thing that is new here with
Speaker 2: AI is that historically, I think those like ghoulish tales
Speaker 2: were often told for some sort of political purpose, either
Speaker 2: to you know, vilify some savage enemy or heartless empire
Speaker 2: who committed atrocities on local people, to get the local
Speaker 2: people like riled up for some sort of political end.
Speaker 2: But here maybe there's some sort of end.
Speaker 1: Oh. I think that true crime is always political. I
Speaker 1: think that you don't tell the story of something ghoulish
Speaker 1: happening to someone, especially a child or a woman, without
Speaker 1: there being some kind of whether it's implicit or explicit,
Speaker 1: political agenda. We've seen time and time again where true
Speaker 1: crime and the stories of bad things happening to people
Speaker 1: and people's misfortune is used to strengthen and bolster specific legislation,
Speaker 1: police crackdowns, more policing, increased criminalization of people of color,
Speaker 1: and increased surveillance of of color and the poor. I
Speaker 1: think that true crime stories are often political, even if
Speaker 1: they don't seem political on their face. I think the
Speaker 1: fact that these videos Rollingstone reports that they get millions
Speaker 1: and millions and millions of views and are particularly more
Speaker 1: popular when they feature the stories of murdered children, that
Speaker 1: tells me right there that whether or not these videos
Speaker 1: are explicitly trying to make some sort of political or
Speaker 1: social argument, they absolutely do fuel political and social you know,
Speaker 1: dynamics and are in our culture.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it makes me curious who the perpetrators are in
Speaker 2: these stories, you know. I think that would be a
Speaker 2: pretty interesting thing for somebody to look at to get
Speaker 2: a tack question of what is the political agenda behind
Speaker 2: this new phenomenon on TikTok.
Speaker 1: Well, I mean I don't even necessarily think that it's
Speaker 1: like when I say political, I don't necessarily feel that
Speaker 1: people are posting these because they're like, oh, this is
Speaker 1: going to get everybody miled up, and they're going to
Speaker 1: support X y Z legislation and policing. I'm not saying
Speaker 1: that sometimes they absolutely can be. We see that a
Speaker 1: lot when it comes to true crime content about trafficking,
Speaker 1: that that has then used to support specific legislation. I'm
Speaker 1: not saying that that's what's going on here, but I
Speaker 1: am saying that when people are consuming more and more
Speaker 1: and more content about grizzly murders and torture of children,
Speaker 1: it is just that's not happening in a vacuum. It's
Speaker 1: happening in a culture where we already have conversations about policing,
Speaker 1: about you know, stranger danger, about you know, public safety.
Speaker 1: And so when I say that they're political, I mean
Speaker 1: that they feed into a current cultural conversation around those
Speaker 1: issues that you know, they're not happening. I think it's
Speaker 1: easy for people who are true crime fans to believe
Speaker 1: that they're they're consuming this content in a vacuum standalone,
Speaker 1: like oh, it's just entertainment, I'm just enjoying it. But
Speaker 1: in fact, it is not happening in a vacuum. It
Speaker 1: is happening against the backdrop of already existing conversations about
Speaker 1: things like policing and public safety, which are inherently political.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that makes a lot of sense, you know. Definitely,
Speaker 2: one doesn't have to look very far to see ways
Speaker 2: in which creating a feeling of fear and unease and
Speaker 2: distrust among the population fits pretty squarely with a lot
Speaker 2: of political actors social media efforts. Yeah, social media man
Speaker 2: a powerful thing that plays to our emotions and particularly kids. Huh.
Speaker 1: It sounds like you're setting me up for our next story, Mike.
Speaker 1: So I'm gonna go ahead and take that.
Speaker 2: You know. I'm just trying to do my part over here.
Speaker 1: Last week, US Surgeon General Doctor Murphy issued an advisory
Speaker 1: warning about the impact that social media is happening on
Speaker 1: the mental health of young people. It's a pretty long report,
Speaker 1: but the crux of it is summed up in this
Speaker 1: quote from Mrthy. We are in the middle of a
Speaker 1: national youth mental health crisis, and I am concerned that
Speaker 1: social media is an important driver of that crisis, one
Speaker 1: that we must urgently address.
Speaker 2: So I just want to pause here to emphasize what
Speaker 2: a big deal this is. The Surgeon General's Office doesn't
Speaker 2: issue these kind of reports all the time, and when
Speaker 2: they do, they often have a big impact that can
Speaker 2: last for decades. Right, We probably all remember or know
Speaker 2: about the Certain General's Report on Smoking and Health, which
Speaker 2: really turned the tide on smoking in the US and
Speaker 2: set us up decades later after a lot of fights,
Speaker 2: to be in a place where we are now, where
Speaker 2: fewer Americans smoke now than they have in the past
Speaker 2: hundred years. So it really sets the agenda for a
Speaker 2: whole generation of medical and public health initiatives. And it
Speaker 2: didn't come out of the vacuum either. When it was
Speaker 2: announced from the Certain General's office, there were supportive comments
Speaker 2: from leaders of some of the country's largest medical and
Speaker 2: public health organizations, including the American Academy of Family Physicians,
Speaker 2: the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Medical Association, the
Speaker 2: American Psychiatric Association, American Psychological Association, the American Public Health Association,
Speaker 2: and the National Parent Teacher Association. Right, like, those are
Speaker 2: all ormous institutions that have a huge footprint, a huge impact.
Speaker 2: And so I just mentioned that here to just really
Speaker 2: underscore the point from the Surgeon General support here that
Speaker 2: there's widespread consensus acknowledgment in the public health field that
Speaker 2: social media is causing a lot of harm to our
Speaker 2: young people and we need to do something about it asap.
Speaker 1: So the report does say that social media can have
Speaker 1: benefits to young people and that more researchers needed to
Speaker 1: really understand the impact. So it is a little bit nuanced,
Speaker 1: like it's not all bad, but the main takeaways that
Speaker 1: we need to urgently take action to create safe and
Speaker 1: healthy digital environments that minimize harm and safeguard children and
Speaker 1: adolescents mental health and well being during critical stages of development.
Speaker 1: That's kind of one of the main takeaways of the
Speaker 1: report is that basically young brains are still cooking and
Speaker 1: they don't handle social media very well, which like kind
Speaker 1: of sounds like an obvious point. I always say, like,
Speaker 1: I'm so glad that I didn't have the social media
Speaker 1: climate that we have today with so many platforms that
Speaker 1: I you know what I thirteen, God, I truly God
Speaker 1: only knows what I would have done and what I
Speaker 1: would be like if if if I had access to that.
Speaker 1: But the report says that a highly sensitive period of
Speaker 1: brain development happens between the ages of ten and nineteen,
Speaker 1: which coincides when ninety five percent of thirteen to seventeen
Speaker 1: year olds and nearly forty percent of eight to twelve
Speaker 1: year olds are using social media. The advisory notes that
Speaker 1: frequent use of social media platforms can impact brain development,
Speaker 1: affecting areas associated with emotional learning, impulse control, and social behavior.
Speaker 1: Murphy has previously said that he believes that even thirteen
Speaker 1: year old is too early for children to be using
Speaker 1: social media.
Speaker 2: So there's two things here worth pulling out of that.
Speaker 2: Right Like, social media is particularly harmful for children because
Speaker 2: they are still developing their brains, Like you said, they're
Speaker 2: still cooking, they're not fully formed, and so it's particularly
Speaker 2: dangerous to them during this critical period. And also, we
Speaker 2: have a long tradition in this country and society of
Speaker 2: protecting young people, right Like, there's general agreement that we
Speaker 2: should do more to protect young people than adults because adults,
Speaker 2: they're adults, they're grown, they can make choices for themselves.
Speaker 2: Children can by definition, And so I just wanted to
Speaker 2: identify those two different reasons driving this call for more action.
Speaker 1: So the report does say that social media can be
Speaker 1: particularly beneficial to marginalize youth. It says studies have shown
Speaker 1: that social media may support the mental health and well
Speaker 1: being of lesbian, gay, bisexual, asexual, transgender queer intersects and
Speaker 1: other youths by enabling peer connection, identity development and management,
Speaker 1: and social support. This is also really important because I
Speaker 1: have seen a lot of reporting that suggests that so
Speaker 1: much of the research about the impacts of kids and
Speaker 1: social media tends to be done on white kids, right Like,
Speaker 1: when the researchers are doing that research, they're not necessarily
Speaker 1: also doing research on all kids. And that is particularly
Speaker 1: important because, according to a study from the Youth Media
Speaker 1: and Well Being Research Lab, black and Latino fitth through
Speaker 1: ninth graders adopt social media at a younger age and
Speaker 1: their white peers. And because youth of color have such
Speaker 1: specific online experiences, right Like, these experiences can include things
Speaker 1: like hate speech and racialized harassment, and like racialized language
Speaker 1: being used online. And so if you're not researching and
Speaker 1: looking into the experiences of marginalized kids who are having
Speaker 1: such specific online experiences, I don't necessarily feel like you're
Speaker 1: getting a clear picture of the impact.
Speaker 2: Yeah, totally agree. You know, we in social science we
Speaker 2: talk about intersectionality and the importance of focusing on not
Speaker 2: just different demographic groups, but you know, intersections of them.
Speaker 2: And absolutely there's a lot of reason to think that
Speaker 2: kids from marginalized backgrounds, specific with you know, who identify
Speaker 2: with specific marginalized identities, would have a whole host of
Speaker 2: specific harms and specific benefits that they get from access
Speaker 2: to social media, and we really do need more research
Speaker 2: to understand that. But also at the same time, we
Speaker 2: urgently need restrictions to protect them, right like in this
Speaker 2: in the US regulatory framework, we are reluctant to ever
Speaker 2: try to regulate anything until it is solidly, conclusively demonstrated
Speaker 2: beyond the shadow of a doubt through many lawsuits that like, yes,
Speaker 2: it does is actually harmful, and so we are actually
Speaker 2: able to pass some sort of regulation about it. In
Speaker 2: other countries and in Europe, it's not like that, they're
Speaker 2: much more willing to acknowledge that something is being harmful
Speaker 2: and take action. And I really hope that we can
Speaker 2: do that over here. Well.
Speaker 1: The report calls for just that. It calls for more
Speaker 1: research into the impacts of social media usage and for
Speaker 1: social media companies themselves to be more transparent when it
Speaker 1: comes to sharing data with outside experts. There's also recommendations
Speaker 1: for lawmakers to develop stronger health and safety standards for
Speaker 1: social media products and introduce stricter data privacy controls, which
Speaker 1: plus plus plus plus plus I'm a who's proponent of,
Speaker 1: especially for young people, but also for adults. Technology companies themselves, meanwhile,
Speaker 1: or urge to assess the risk their products might pose
Speaker 1: and attempt to minimize them. The report also mentioned something
Speaker 1: that I find pretty important, and that is the role
Speaker 1: that parents can and should be playing. The report says
Speaker 1: the onus of mitigating the potential harms on social media
Speaker 1: should not be placed solely on the shoulders of parents
Speaker 1: and caregivers, or on children themselves. So this is where
Speaker 1: I kind of have a lot to say. The people
Speaker 1: who run social media platforms are making billions of dollars
Speaker 1: from harming our kids. Parents and caregivers have been burdened
Speaker 1: so much, especially in the last few years, having to
Speaker 1: manage virtual learning, shifting workplace policies around remote work. You
Speaker 1: know you can work from home now you get to
Speaker 1: come back to the office. Attacks on schools, just to
Speaker 1: name a few. Tech billionaires know that their technology harms kids.
Speaker 1: Facebook is aware. We learn that from Francis Hougen's Facebook papers.
Speaker 1: Facebook cannot say from their own internal reports, Facebook is
Speaker 1: aware that their product harms kids. End of sentence, full stop.
Speaker 1: So these tech billionaires know that their product's harm kids,
Speaker 1: and they make billions of dollars from it from that harm,
Speaker 1: while doing nothing to meaningfully mitigate how kids are showing
Speaker 1: up to their platforms, and then to turn around and
Speaker 1: then further burden parents to keep their kids away from
Speaker 1: these platforms is unacceptable to me. And it also speaks
Speaker 1: to the the really extractive relationship that I talked about
Speaker 1: in the episode that we put out on Tuesday with
Speaker 1: Paris Marks, where there's just an expectation that it is
Speaker 1: fine for tech billionaires to do harm to the public,
Speaker 1: including harm to our kids, if it makes them more money.
Speaker 1: And it's clear that that extends to harm to some
Speaker 1: of our most vulnerable children. We need to make it
Speaker 1: clear that our kids well being is not for sale.
Speaker 1: We are not sacrificing the health, safety, and wellbeing of
Speaker 1: our children to help make Mark Zuckerberg more money. And
Speaker 1: that's really what it comes down to. These companies know
Speaker 1: what they're doing, they know they are causing harm. You know,
Speaker 1: I respect this report, But I feel like in places
Speaker 1: this report makes it seem like tech companies don't already
Speaker 1: know that their products cause harm, that young people are
Speaker 1: using them, and that it's causing them a lot of harm.
Speaker 1: They do know that, and so we did a start
Speaker 1: from that reality. They know they're making billions of dollars
Speaker 1: of it, and they're doing nothing to stop it, and
Speaker 1: that's despicable, and.
Speaker 2: It's going to take some kind of either regulation or
Speaker 2: new framework for lawsuits or something to go after them.
Speaker 2: But you know, they're making a product that demonstrably harms kids. Right,
Speaker 2: There's not that many categories of products where you can
Speaker 2: get away with that. I think in the case of
Speaker 2: social media companies, it's a little bit complicated by free speech,
Speaker 2: you know, the First Amendment and also Section two thirty,
Speaker 2: which we've talked about on this podcast, and I wouldn't
Speaker 2: pretend it's not complicated, but you just can't. We can't
Speaker 2: continue with this extremely powerful, important product that increasingly people
Speaker 2: need to be on to interact in society that also
Speaker 2: is just like harming people, and all of the responsibility
Speaker 2: is placed on the individuals for not just proticting themselves
Speaker 2: but their family. It's just it's nonsense and it doesn't work,
Speaker 2: and it's not working.
Speaker 1: Well, That's my thing is that parents already have to
Speaker 1: do so much. You can't just create a harmful thing
Speaker 1: and then be like, oh, well, just another thing that
Speaker 1: parents it's up to them to keep this out of
Speaker 1: their kids' hands, even though it's everywhere, even though that's
Speaker 1: basically impossible. That's not a reasonable standard for parents too.
Speaker 1: That's too big of a burden, especially when somebody is
Speaker 1: people are making money off of it. And so you know,
Speaker 1: I'm not a parent myself, but I do have a
Speaker 1: lot of young people in my life. I'm close to
Speaker 1: a lot of younger folks. I often have said the
Speaker 1: thing that everybody before they have kids in the twenty
Speaker 1: the two thousand says, it's like, when I have a child,
Speaker 1: my child will never look at a scream. It's gonna
Speaker 1: be books and wooden toys and nothing else. And in
Speaker 1: twenty twenty three, be for real, right, Like, if if
Speaker 1: you are listening and you are keeping your kid away
Speaker 1: from screens, and you are very diligent about screen time,
Speaker 1: I applaud you. I say, I can't tell you how
Speaker 1: many times I have smugly told somebody that that is
Speaker 1: the kind of parent I intend to be if in
Speaker 1: when I have a child. But it's not a realistic standard, right,
Speaker 1: like and allowing your kids access to social Like, kids
Speaker 1: need to be online and they need to learn how
Speaker 1: to have safe online experiences. I think the owners should
Speaker 1: be on social media companies to not have platforms be
Speaker 1: marketplaces for their pain and instead be places where they
Speaker 1: can explore the internet safely and learn how to come
Speaker 1: up digital age safely. And yeah, I think, like if
Speaker 1: you like, it shouldn't just be up to parents who
Speaker 1: are already burdened with so much to meet this impossible
Speaker 1: standard of just keeping their kids away from social media platforms.
Speaker 1: This is not realistic.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's not realistic, and it's not it's not an
Speaker 2: either or thing, right, It's like a false dichotomy. Parents
Speaker 2: always will ultimately have the ultimate responsibility for protecting their kids.
Speaker 2: But at the same time, we should have some regulations
Speaker 2: in place that prevent extremely harmful, dangerous platforms from just
Speaker 2: being widely available and easily accessible to this kids. If
Speaker 2: you think about other categories of products that we have
Speaker 2: special laws to protect kids from tobacco, alcohol, I don't
Speaker 2: know there's probably some others that I should be able
Speaker 2: to think of, but I can't. But like, we have
Speaker 2: laws designed to make those harmful products less easily accessible
Speaker 2: to young people because there is clear evidence that that
Speaker 2: is effective at protecting them from it. Why can't we
Speaker 2: have that with social media?
Speaker 1: What's interesting is that the Surgeon General says that thirteen
Speaker 1: is too young to be on social media platforms. If
Speaker 1: you saw the documentary The Social Dilemma, which is one
Speaker 1: of my favorite documentaries where its features all of these
Speaker 1: people who make social media platforms, like engineers, talking about
Speaker 1: the harm that they know that these platforms have been
Speaker 1: responsible for. The movie is great. It goes into all
Speaker 1: these different ways that these platforms cause harm and get
Speaker 1: you addictated and all of that. At the end, I
Speaker 1: think it might even be a post credit scene. All
Speaker 1: of these people who I mean, I hate to say it,
Speaker 1: but insensibly made money creating these things that they then
Speaker 1: go on to be like, oh, they're very dangerous, talk
Speaker 1: about the role that social media plays in their household.
Speaker 1: None of them let their kids on social media. And
Speaker 1: these are people who build social media platforms. That really
Speaker 1: told me something of like, these are the people who
Speaker 1: built technology, and the technology that they built they don't
Speaker 1: let their kids have they not allow in their homes
Speaker 1: or around their children.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it makes sense. If you're building harmful stuff that
Speaker 2: you know harms tens of millions of young people, you
Speaker 2: probably need to sell yourself a story about personal responsibility
Speaker 2: to absolve yourself of the guilt of knowing that you
Speaker 2: are pushing this product out into the world and actively
Speaker 2: trying to get more kids to use it even though
Speaker 2: it's going to hurt a lot of them.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it is dirty business. Our kids. I mean, I
Speaker 1: say this all the time. Our kids experiences should not
Speaker 1: be for sale. We should not the dynamic where your
Speaker 1: children are hurt and harmed in real ways so that
Speaker 1: Mark Zuckerberg can get richer. We need to reject that dynamic.
Speaker 1: I don't get that. I don't care if I don't
Speaker 1: care if he goes bankrupt. Our kids experiences should not
Speaker 1: be used to line the pockets of tech billionaires. And
Speaker 1: ill guess I'll just leave it there.
Speaker 3: Let's take a quick break and are back.
Speaker 2: Are there have there redity stories this past week about
Speaker 2: something positive happening in tech regulation.
Speaker 1: I don't know if I would say positive, but there
Speaker 1: have been some tech regulation news. Let's turn to New
Speaker 1: York City where they have just passed a new law
Speaker 1: around AI and hiring. So, in all this talk around
Speaker 1: AI and jobs and how AI is going to impact
Speaker 1: all of our jobs, it's clear there is need for
Speaker 1: some kind of legislation or regulation to regulate how AI
Speaker 1: impacts the workforce. The New York Times reports at New
Speaker 1: York City just passed a law that requires companies using
Speaker 1: AI software and hiring to notify candidates that an automated
Speaker 1: system is being used. It also requires companies to have
Speaker 1: independent auditors check the technology annually for bias. Candidates can
Speaker 1: request and be told what data is being collected and
Speaker 1: analyzed about them, and companies can be fined for violations.
Speaker 1: Labor experts actually say that this law in New York
Speaker 1: City could potentially be expanded nationwide. California, New Jersey, New
Speaker 1: York and Vermont and DC heyy my hometown are all
Speaker 1: working on laws to regulate AI and hiring. Now, this
Speaker 1: sounds like a really positive step in the right direction,
Speaker 1: but some critics argue that the law is too biased
Speaker 1: towards businesses and corporate interests and has been watered down
Speaker 1: to the point of not being effective. What could have
Speaker 1: been a landmark law was watered down to lose effectiveness.
Speaker 1: That's from Alexandra Gibvens, the president for the Center for
Speaker 1: Democracy and Technology, a policy and civil rights organization. That's
Speaker 1: what you told The New York Times. So you might
Speaker 1: be wondering, well, what's so wrong with this law? It
Speaker 1: sounds pretty good. This gets a little in the weeds.
Speaker 1: But here's how the New York Times breaks down her
Speaker 1: opposition to this law. They right, The law defines an
Speaker 1: automated employment decision tool as technology used to substantially assist
Speaker 1: or replace discretionary decision making. The rule adopted by the
Speaker 1: city appears to interpret that phrasing narrowly, so that AI
Speaker 1: software will require an audit only if it is the
Speaker 1: loan or primary factor and a hiring decision, or if
Speaker 1: it is used to override a human All of this
Speaker 1: leaves out the main way that automated software is used,
Speaker 1: with a human hiring manager invariably making the final choice.
Speaker 1: The potential for AI driven discrimination typically comes in the
Speaker 1: screening of hundreds of thousands of candidates down to a handful,
Speaker 1: or in targeted online recruiting to generate a pool of candidates.
Speaker 1: So basically what she is saying is that the definition
Speaker 1: of whether or not AI is being employed in an
Speaker 1: unemployment decision is so narrow that a company would very
Speaker 1: rarely ever need to notify a candidate or perform an
Speaker 1: audit under this law. Basically, they're saying that like they
Speaker 1: are defining AI being used as an employment decision if
Speaker 1: it is the only thing making a decision, or if
Speaker 1: it overrides a human decision. In reality, that is not
Speaker 1: usually the case. AI can be used to narrow down candidates,
Speaker 1: but generally it is there is a human involved in
Speaker 1: the process. So in the more typical iteration of how
Speaker 1: things usually work with AI and hiring, very few companies
Speaker 1: need to change their behavior under this law because of
Speaker 1: that narrow definition of AI in the screening process. She
Speaker 1: also objects to the fact that the law covers screening
Speaker 1: candidates using AI for gender, race, and ethnicity, but not
Speaker 1: for disability or age, which we know are big parts
Speaker 1: of employment discrimination as is, So if this law does
Speaker 1: become a national template, as it very well might, it
Speaker 1: might not be as robust as it should be to
Speaker 1: actually protect workers.
Speaker 2: I really want to interpret this is a good start, though,
Speaker 2: you know, she's definitely the expert and probably right about
Speaker 2: it being too narrow, but like, maybe there'll be some
Speaker 2: court case that interprets it a little more broadly. You know,
Speaker 2: I appreciate that this law at least attempts to establish
Speaker 2: some boundaries on what is acceptable to use AI for,
Speaker 2: especially something as important as employment, and so, I don't know,
Speaker 2: it feels nice that some legislators are at least trying,
Speaker 2: And it seems like it would be hard for companies
Speaker 2: to argue that being transparent about the software they use
Speaker 2: is somehow an unacceptable burden to their hiring. So hopefully
Speaker 2: this can be either amended or built on to maybe
Speaker 2: expand that definition, add some teeth to it so that
Speaker 2: it does become more accepted and expected, even that throughout
Speaker 2: the hiring process, any sort of AI that even has
Speaker 2: the potential to discriminate needs to be disclosed. At the
Speaker 2: very least, it seems like asking to have it disclosed
Speaker 2: shouldn't be objected to.
Speaker 1: People deserve transparency when they're engaging with technology like this,
Speaker 1: and I think that's probably one of my biggest concerns
Speaker 1: about this technology, is that it's simply going to repeat
Speaker 1: and also make worse the existing biases that are already
Speaker 1: in our society. And so I think we definitely need strong, clear,
Speaker 1: robust legislation to prevent that from happening. So I am
Speaker 1: happy to see some legislation that it's not just a
Speaker 1: wild West, but I want to make sure it's legislation
Speaker 1: that acts. She really provides some meaningful and robust protection
Speaker 1: for all of us.
Speaker 2: Have you got any stories for me about health tech, bridget.
Speaker 1: Let's talk about health tech, Mike.
Speaker 2: So.
Speaker 1: Back in March, staffers at the National Eating Disorder Association
Speaker 1: were laid off just days after they voted to unionize. Subsequently,
Speaker 1: the National Eating Disorders Association, or NEDA, announced they were
Speaker 1: shutting down their twenty year old call in helpline for
Speaker 1: folks dealing with disordered eating and food issues. They replaced
Speaker 1: a handful of paid staffers and a large group of
Speaker 1: volunteers with a chatbot called Tessa. Well. It turns out
Speaker 1: that Tessa did not do so great because, rather than
Speaker 1: giving counseling to people calling in for help with their
Speaker 1: disordered eating, Tessa was found to be giving these people
Speaker 1: weight loss and diet advice. A psychologist who specializes in
Speaker 1: eating disorders ran a test with Tessa where she fed
Speaker 1: it questions that someone seeking help for disordered eating might ask.
Speaker 1: She pretended to be somebody who had recently gained weight
Speaker 1: and subsequently hated their body. Tessa responded quote, approach weight
Speaker 1: loss in a healthy and sustainable way. When the psychologist
Speaker 1: followed up asking what that might look like, Tessa responded
Speaker 1: with information about calorie deficits. Tessa provided information like how
Speaker 1: to cut calories and how to avoid certain foods, which
Speaker 1: is certainly not good advice to give somebody specifically engaging
Speaker 1: with this spot for help with food issues and disordered eating.
Speaker 1: So this is really interesting. Wired reports that Tessa was
Speaker 1: not built using AI like chatbots like chat GPT. Instead,
Speaker 1: Tessa is programmed to deliver an interactive program called body Positive,
Speaker 1: a cognitive behavioral therapy based tool meant to prevent, not treat,
Speaker 1: eating disorders, says Ellen Fitzimmons Craft, a professor of psychiatry
Speaker 1: at Washington University School of Medicine who developed the program.
Speaker 1: But here's where it gets weird. Fit simmons Craft says
Speaker 1: that the weight loss advice given was not part of
Speaker 1: the program that her team worked to develop. And she
Speaker 1: does not know how Tessa got it into her repertoire,
Speaker 1: Which is pretty scary that this non AI chatbot went
Speaker 1: off script from the body positive program that it was
Speaker 1: programmed to respond with and started saying advice about how
Speaker 1: to lose weight and how to have a calorie deficit,
Speaker 1: and the people who programmed it just have no idea
Speaker 1: how or why it was able to go off script
Speaker 1: in that very particular way. Pretty scary, right it is.
Speaker 2: And I have a lot of questions about how that
Speaker 2: might have happened. You know, I looked into this a
Speaker 2: little bit, and their study was published in a reputable journal.
Speaker 2: It had a good, solid design. So I really feel
Speaker 2: for the researcher here, for Simmons Crafts, because it's by
Speaker 2: from everything I can tell, you know, she's like a
Speaker 2: legitimate researcher who legitimately is like doing good science, trying
Speaker 2: to help people. And you know, it's not crazy to
Speaker 2: imagine that that the researcher who created this tool would
Speaker 2: not be the same people who decided that at the
Speaker 2: programmatic level it should be used by the program to
Speaker 2: replace the human coaches. Maybe maybe they were involved, maybe
Speaker 2: they weren't. I don't know, and like maybe yeah, I'm
Speaker 2: just like super curious about what it means that she
Speaker 2: says the program did not have any of that content,
Speaker 2: Like where did it come from? Who put it there?
Speaker 2: You know, these are questions I'm really interested in. I
Speaker 2: would love to know more.
Speaker 1: The robots are going rogue and they want us to
Speaker 1: lose weight. I think I think that's clear that's what's
Speaker 1: going on here.
Speaker 2: Maybe, but like I feel like they'd want to fatten
Speaker 2: us up to provide more calories for their like robot machines.
Speaker 1: Robots are going to be eating humans.
Speaker 2: That's how they'll be digesting us for fuel obviously.
Speaker 1: Okay, so this is kind of important context. The NDA
Speaker 1: says that they were not and are not planning on
Speaker 1: replacing humans with chatbots, but it does sound that like
Speaker 1: that in the midst of this staff shakeup after their
Speaker 1: their unionization effort, it does sound like this chatbot was
Speaker 1: the only resource that they had to offer the public.
Speaker 1: So they might say that they weren't intending to replace
Speaker 1: humans with this bot, but subsequently that's like kind of
Speaker 1: what happened, whether that was their intention or not.
Speaker 2: Yet, it's again hard to know what to make of
Speaker 2: the fat the idea that like, they didn't intend to
Speaker 2: do the thing that their organization did, Like, where did
Speaker 2: that come from? Was TESLA calling the shots at the
Speaker 2: board meeting? It seems a little I don't know, it
Speaker 2: just feels a little sketchy to me, honestly, Like, yeah,
Speaker 2: the unionization part, they're like they According to the NPR
Speaker 2: article that we read it as linked in the show
Speaker 2: notes here, it's such an internal email at any DA
Speaker 2: that points to increase legal risks about crisis handling and
Speaker 2: mandatory reporting is one of the reasons for laying off
Speaker 2: the coaches. But then it just doesn't make sense that
Speaker 2: they would start to me, at least, it doesn't make
Speaker 2: sense that they would start using a chatbot as a replacement,
Speaker 2: as if that would somehow be less risky. It just
Speaker 2: seems odd, you know, and laying off workers within days
Speaker 2: of a vote to unionize feels super gross. So I
Speaker 2: think it's important to sort of separate the two different
Speaker 2: stories here, Like the chat bot that worked as a
Speaker 2: prevention tool to help prevent people, because that study that
Speaker 2: Fit Simmonscraft authored demonstrates that it did really help people
Speaker 2: with preventing eating disorders. But then it got used in
Speaker 2: this other context where it was actually harming people. That's
Speaker 2: interesting and worth talking about. And then also it seems
Speaker 2: like this organization did not want to deal with the
Speaker 2: union and so like replaced all their humans as soon
Speaker 2: as they unionized, which is pretty disappointing for a nonprofit
Speaker 2: organization that osensibly is trying to help people.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I have to say, like, when I first
Speaker 1: chose this story to include in the roundup for today's episode,
Speaker 1: I was like, this is a story about like what
Speaker 1: I can I can ever say the word right shot
Speaker 1: shot in Freuda, I always say it wrong. It's funny.
Speaker 1: There's a one of our Patreon patrons has that as
Speaker 1: their their like Patreon name, and I damn them, And
Speaker 1: I was like, I can never. I have to like
Speaker 1: look it up every time. Shot and Freuda. I think
Speaker 1: that's how you say it. When I first heard the story,
Speaker 1: I was like, Oh, this is what they get for
Speaker 1: firing their unionizing humans and trying to replace the unionizing
Speaker 1: humans with a robot like haha, dunk on them. But
Speaker 1: as I looked into it, more like, it's really easy
Speaker 1: to make fun of the n EDA here, but it
Speaker 1: really does highlight what I think is a pretty serious
Speaker 1: issue that a lot of people need access to mental
Speaker 1: health services and support, and that access is still out
Speaker 1: of reach for so many, which is why an organization,
Speaker 1: you know, like an e EDA would feel like they
Speaker 1: could they had to turn to chatbots to sort of
Speaker 1: close that gap. So it's easy to dunk on them here,
Speaker 1: but ultimately that is a real problem that we do
Speaker 1: need to solve for Whether or not technology like chat
Speaker 1: bots and AI can solve for it, I don't know.
Speaker 1: That's not something I know about, but it is a
Speaker 1: real problem. And Mike, I know that when you're not
Speaker 1: producing the show, this is something that you actually work on, right.
Speaker 2: That's right, Yeah, I When I'm not producing the show,
Speaker 2: I do research with a nonprofit that creates free digital
Speaker 2: tools to help support behavior, help behavior change, and help
Speaker 2: people overcome addiction. And so I do like know a
Speaker 2: fair a fair bit about this. This is an area
Speaker 2: where I'm actively doing research and actively working in a
Speaker 2: nonprofit where we run public programs that provide support for
Speaker 2: health behavior change over the Internet. And we've been talking
Speaker 2: a lot about chatbots lately and what role they can
Speaker 2: or should have for providing digital health services, because, as
Speaker 2: you mentioned, there is this huge unmet need for mental
Speaker 2: health services as well as other kinds of behavioral health
Speaker 2: services like smoking cessation, diabetes management. You know, there's there's
Speaker 2: just you know, physical exercise, healthy eating, so many health
Speaker 2: behaviors that cause a lot of medical harmor medical costs,
Speaker 2: reduce you know, good healthy years that people live on
Speaker 2: their lives. There's this huge unmet need for it. And
Speaker 2: if we can use digital technology to meet that need
Speaker 2: and connect people with resources that help them meet their
Speaker 2: health goals and adopt healthier behaviors that they want to adopt,
Speaker 2: but uh for various reasons, often including industries that aggressively
Speaker 2: market them to prevent them from achieving those healthier behaviors
Speaker 2: that they want to achieve. And so I can use
Speaker 2: digital technology to meet that need and help support people
Speaker 2: to adopt these healthier behaviors that they're trying to adopt.
Speaker 2: That would be a huge win for everyone. But there's
Speaker 2: this question of how to do it right. And with
Speaker 2: generative AI chatbots in particular, we have no idea what
Speaker 2: kind of advice they might give to a person looking
Speaker 2: for help, and so there's a risk as the national
Speaker 2: what is it, the National Eating Disorders Association found out
Speaker 2: there's a risk that somebody who is in crisis or
Speaker 2: who is really experiencing a problem might ask for help
Speaker 2: and receive advice that actually turns out to be harmful
Speaker 2: for them. And that's, you know, as somebody who designs
Speaker 2: health interventions, that is terrifying. You know, the risk is
Speaker 2: especially high for people in crisis. You know, for example,
Speaker 2: people who are in suicidal or intend to harm others
Speaker 2: because they're more vulnerable, and so we have a greater
Speaker 2: obligation to protect those people who are the most vulnerable,
Speaker 2: you know. I guess another related thing is that generally
Speaker 2: in public health, we give more priority to not causing
Speaker 2: harm compared to helping people. Right, Like, everyone is probably
Speaker 2: familiar with the trolley problem, and again it's especially the
Speaker 2: case when people are at risk of being harmed who
Speaker 2: are already vulnerable. We really want to protect them and
Speaker 2: make sure that whatever treatment we're giving to try to
Speaker 2: help is not causing more harm. So that unknown factor
Speaker 2: about generative AI and chatbots, I think we give a
Speaker 2: lot of people in positions to provide them to the
Speaker 2: public pause about using those chatbots to deliver mental health
Speaker 2: support in particular, you know, there is a lot of
Speaker 2: potential there, as the researcher we mentioned demonstrated, you know,
Speaker 2: or programmed Tessa really did help some people. So there's
Speaker 2: a lot of potential, but we creators need to be
Speaker 2: to carefully protect against adverse outcomes and risks to users,
Speaker 2: especially among the most vulnerable. And so it sounds like
Speaker 2: the version of Tessa that was implemented on their website
Speaker 2: didn't do that. And so I think it's good that
Speaker 2: the service has been taken down until it can be
Speaker 2: you know, changed in whatever way is needed that it
Speaker 2: can then be demonstrated to be safe to be made
Speaker 2: available to the public. Again.
Speaker 1: You know who else I think might need to be
Speaker 1: taken down until it can be demonstrated that they are
Speaker 1: safe for the public. Elon Musk, I'll tell you I
Speaker 1: after this quick.
Speaker 3: Break more, after a quick break, let's get right back
Speaker 3: into it.
Speaker 1: Let's talk about Twitter.
Speaker 2: It might be a while before we can demonstrate that
Speaker 2: he is not a king to the public.
Speaker 1: Agreed. Okay, So this is I'm going to try to
Speaker 1: rein it in because this story makes me so fucking mard. Okay,
Speaker 1: Over the weekend, a verified parody account on Twitter that
Speaker 1: looks an awful lot, like the real Twitter account for
Speaker 1: Representative Alexandria Ocazio. Cortez claimed to have a crush on
Speaker 1: Elon Musk. Elon Musk replied with a fire emoji. Of
Speaker 1: course it was not the real AOC. It was a
Speaker 1: parody heavy scare quotes account. The account has been around
Speaker 1: since twenty eighteen, but it was permanently suspended in twenty
Speaker 1: nineteen under Jack Dorsey, the former Twitter CEO's leadership for
Speaker 1: misleading parity content. I should say here that like this
Speaker 1: is a real problem online and where there are accounts
Speaker 1: that just say off the wall stuff and they say, oh,
Speaker 1: I'm parody, but it's not really a joke. It's hard
Speaker 1: to explain, but you know, you definitely have seen them.
Speaker 1: You know them when you see them where they're able
Speaker 1: to hide behind parody when you know that it's not parody. Right,
Speaker 1: like AOC saying that she has a crush on Elon Musk,
Speaker 1: that's not parody, that's something else. So that's neither he
Speaker 1: nor there. So this Twitter account had been permanent suspended
Speaker 1: by Twitter back in twenty nineteen, but Musk reinstated it
Speaker 1: when he brought back a bunch of band accounts, and
Speaker 1: because of the way that Musk's verification system works, which
Speaker 1: is basically pay to play. If you pay the eight
Speaker 1: dollars to get verified, it boosts your you know, your
Speaker 1: content and search and on the feed, it actually boosts
Speaker 1: the fake account because it is verified. So currently, and
Speaker 1: I tried this right before we started recording, when you
Speaker 1: searched AOC on Twitter, the fake AOC is ranked first
Speaker 1: in search results, above the actual, authentic AOC's official account
Speaker 1: because it's verified. So Musk is boosting this fake account
Speaker 1: both because of the way that Twitter Blue works, but
Speaker 1: he is also personally boosting this account because he is
Speaker 1: engaging with it from his own individual Twitter account.
Speaker 2: It's so disgusting. He's such a pathetic creep. You know,
Speaker 2: he knows it's a fake account. He unbanned it anyway,
Speaker 2: and now he's engaging with it and boosting with it.
Speaker 1: Just ugh ugh is right. So the real AOC tweeted, FYI,
Speaker 1: there's a fake account on here, impersonating me and going viral.
Speaker 1: The Twitter CEO has engaged it, boosting visibility. It is
Speaker 1: releasing false policy statements and gaining spread. I am assessing
Speaker 1: with my team how to move forward. In the meantime,
Speaker 1: be careful what you see. Soon after the real AOC
Speaker 1: tweeted that the fake account tweeted the exact same thing
Speaker 1: word for word. Now, parody accounts on Twitter are required
Speaker 1: to spell out that they're parody accounts, but as of today,
Speaker 1: when you look at the fake AOC accounts tweets on mobile,
Speaker 1: the word parity is cut off, so there's no quick
Speaker 1: visual way to differentiate that this is not the real AOC.
Speaker 1: If a user is just encountering these fake AOC tweets
Speaker 1: in their feed on mobile right like, you would have
Speaker 1: to click all the way into the profile to see
Speaker 1: that it is a parody. There is no visual marker.
Speaker 1: It has her image, it is verified. If you saw
Speaker 1: this quickly on mobile, you would think it was the
Speaker 1: real AOC. And particularly the platforms like Twitter move so
Speaker 1: quickly and they encourage you to move so quickly that
Speaker 1: people aren't I don't think people are going to be
Speaker 1: checking to see if this is the real account or not.
Speaker 2: If only there was some visual marker that people could
Speaker 2: use to quickly see which accounts are like actually the
Speaker 2: people who say they are in which ones aren't. If
Speaker 2: only such a system like that existed, but maybe it's
Speaker 2: just impossible and I'm dreaming.
Speaker 1: Oh my god. I mean, we did a whole episode
Speaker 1: about verification for my project with cool Zone Media called
Speaker 1: Internet Hate Machine, about how it's it's not just like
Speaker 1: a vanity thing, like it really matters that people are
Speaker 1: who they say they are. Just I think two weeks
Speaker 1: ago here in DC, there was a tweet two tweets
Speaker 1: from a verified account that said that there was a
Speaker 1: massive explosion in DC by the Pentagon, and it had
Speaker 1: a very compelling image that looked that looked like a
Speaker 1: lot of smoke and flames in the Pentagon, and it
Speaker 1: actually caused an IRL traffic disruption here in DC because
Speaker 1: people thought, like, oh, don't drive by the Pentagon. And
Speaker 1: it was fake. It was it was a verified account
Speaker 1: spreading inaccurate information that looked real. And so I really
Speaker 1: truly worry what happens when people at scale are buying
Speaker 1: verifications and using it to disrupt, using it to confuse,
Speaker 1: using it to cause chaos.
Speaker 2: And I think that fake tweet about the fire at
Speaker 2: the Pentagon, which was just like a fate made up thing.
Speaker 2: I think it also like tanked the stock market for
Speaker 2: a little while and it like cost a bunch of
Speaker 2: people a ton of money.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it makes me sad to say, but I always
Speaker 1: say this when rich people and corporations had their bottom
Speaker 1: lines impacted. I think that's the I think. I mean
Speaker 1: this probably sounds so pessimistic. I think that is one
Speaker 1: of the last bastions of doing something that we have
Speaker 1: in this country. If regular people are harmed, who cares
Speaker 1: If if somebody, if a corporation or the market is impacted,
Speaker 1: then I think people will pay attention. It makes me
Speaker 1: sad to say, but I do firmly believe it. That's
Speaker 1: like the last lever that anybody with power cares about
Speaker 1: in this country.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I just ask Elizabeth Holmes.
Speaker 1: Yep, just thinking about her, my girl. It's also, by
Speaker 1: the way, it's Liz Now she rebranded. I don't know
Speaker 1: if you saw.
Speaker 2: I did not it's Liz.
Speaker 1: It's Liz Now. Although but in fact she I am
Speaker 1: so like I swear that I did not plan this.
Speaker 1: I wanted to find a way to work in this
Speaker 1: tidbit that Elizabeth Holmes is going to be in the
Speaker 1: same jail as Jen Shaw from Real Housewives as Salt
Speaker 1: Lake City. No, yes, yes, okay, So just that's information
Speaker 1: for y'all if you visit a real overlap of shit
Speaker 1: that I care about, housewives like Bravo Housewives and tech scams.
Speaker 2: Yeah wow, I wonder if there's gonna be buds.
Speaker 1: You know they there is no way that Genshaw is
Speaker 1: not already scheming how to get this woman on her team.
Speaker 1: I'll want to say that, I know, I know my Genshaw.
Speaker 1: She's already scheming to get this woman on her team.
Speaker 2: Trust boy, Liz better keep an eye out seriously.
Speaker 1: Okay, So back to this parody account. NBC News dug
Speaker 1: into this account and they found that, according to the
Speaker 1: Social Blade, a social media analytics tracker, the AOC parody
Speaker 1: account had eighty five thousand followers back in May twenty nineteen,
Speaker 1: the same month it was suspended. After the account was
Speaker 1: restored in May of twenty twenty three, it immediately lost
Speaker 1: sixteen thousand followers. Then the account shot back up to
Speaker 1: over eighty thousand followers on May twenty ninth after Musk
Speaker 1: replied to it. On May thirtieth, the day that AOC
Speaker 1: responded to the account, it gained over one hundred thousand followers.
Speaker 1: It has continued to climb today. Let's just check and
Speaker 1: see how many it has as of right now. I
Speaker 1: meant to do this before we taped, but I forgot.
Speaker 2: That's okay, we can do it in real time for
Speaker 2: the listeners.
Speaker 1: Today it has three hundred and ninety one point one
Speaker 1: k followers. That is a lot of followers.
Speaker 2: That's a lot of followers. That's more than like a
Speaker 2: four hundred percent increase from before Musk replied to it.
Speaker 1: So obviously Musk replying to it and engaging with it
Speaker 1: has helped it grow in followers. Helped this account that
Speaker 1: is not accurate, it's confusing, and is not easily and
Speaker 1: clearly distinguishable as parody on mobile. He's clearly helped for
Speaker 1: it to grow. What's even wilder is that NBC found
Speaker 1: that the fake AOC account was run, at least initially
Speaker 1: by a GOP operative. It was first started by Michael Morrison,
Speaker 1: whose Twitter profile indicates him as a member of the
Speaker 1: New York Republicans Club. Morrison posted about the suspensions on
Speaker 1: his account on the conservative social media platform gabbed, where
Speaker 1: he also posted from a parody of AOC's official account.
Speaker 1: Between April twenty nineteen and July of twenty nineteen. The
Speaker 1: post shared on gab were more sexually explicit, and the
Speaker 1: account reshared posts from other users that contained racist slurs. Surprise, surprise,
Speaker 1: this guy sucks God.
Speaker 2: These people are such troglodites. Like, of course it's sexually explicit. Like,
Speaker 2: let's remember that the original tweet that Musk replied to
Speaker 2: with a fire emoji was the parody account pretending the
Speaker 2: AOC liked him and had a crush on him.
Speaker 1: I want to come back to that. I should mention
Speaker 1: that NBC says that they reached out to Morrison and
Speaker 1: he said that he no longer runs this AOC parody
Speaker 1: Twitter account and that he thinks it might be run
Speaker 1: by a team of people. Take that for what it's worth, Like,
Speaker 1: that's that's what he told them. I'm not I don't
Speaker 1: know if that's true or not. Who knows. So I
Speaker 1: have talked about about verification and impersonation on Twitter with
Speaker 1: that a whole episode of Internet Hate Machine about it.
Speaker 1: You know, having a blue check mark is not just
Speaker 1: a vanity thing. It really did start as a way
Speaker 1: to help identify help users identify people are who they
Speaker 1: say they are, and it's been a way to provide
Speaker 1: securities for folks who are at the risk of being
Speaker 1: impersonated online. We already know that impersonating black women and
Speaker 1: women of color on Twitter can cause chaos, and that's
Speaker 1: a thing that bad actors do intentionally to do that.
Speaker 1: So it's not surprising to me that AOC is being targeted. Also,
Speaker 1: I should say that the obvious thing, Mike, that you
Speaker 1: brought up that we kind of can't not mention is
Speaker 1: that this parody account is targeting a woman of color
Speaker 1: elected official, and they're not just using this account to
Speaker 1: like poke thon at her political or policy decisions. It
Speaker 1: is making her say things like she has a crush
Speaker 1: on Elon Musk, and the real Elon Musk pathetically replies,
Speaker 1: let's be super clear. This is so obviously about you,
Speaker 1: a woman of colors, gender, race, age, and sexuality, to
Speaker 1: belittle her because she is a public figure. It is
Speaker 1: about weaponizing her identity. And I think part of it
Speaker 1: is that, like, AOC is an attractive young woman, and
Speaker 1: so there is this thing when you are an attractive
Speaker 1: young woman who is also in public that it listits
Speaker 1: this really gross behavior and it's all kind of linked, right,
Speaker 1: like hating her being obsessed with her being titillated by
Speaker 1: her putting her down. It's all sides of the same
Speaker 1: fucked up coin. And I have said this at one
Speaker 1: million times. But it's also not just about AOC. It
Speaker 1: is meant to send a message to other young women
Speaker 1: who would be potential like civic leaders, or might run
Speaker 1: for office, or be activists or be public in their communities,
Speaker 1: that this is what you will have to deal with.
Speaker 1: If you are a young woman, a woman of color,
Speaker 1: or a black woman who speaks up and wants to
Speaker 1: represent your community publicly, this is what you will have
Speaker 1: to endure. The harassment will be in plain sight, and
Speaker 1: it will be endorsed and on and enabled by the
Speaker 1: powers that be in this case Elon Musk. So if
Speaker 1: you run for office, or become an activist, or become
Speaker 1: somebody who uses a public profile to advocate for things
Speaker 1: that you care about and help your community, this is
Speaker 1: what you have to deal with. It is systemic, It
Speaker 1: is anti democratic. It stifles free speech because think of
Speaker 1: all the women who will not speak up, who will
Speaker 1: not run for office, who will not serve their communities
Speaker 1: because they don't want to have to deal with this
Speaker 1: kind of crap, and I don't blame them. Cheap, crass
Speaker 1: quote jokes like this should not be the cost of
Speaker 1: serving as an elected official, but if you're a young woman,
Speaker 1: especially a woman of color, or a young queer person,
Speaker 1: a young trans person, it absolutely is. And Elon Musk
Speaker 1: obviously does not give a shit about his responsibility to
Speaker 1: make Twitter a place where this is not commonplace. In fact,
Speaker 1: he's so pathetic that it's probably like feeding his ego
Speaker 1: the chance to be able to pretend, like even for
Speaker 1: a second, that there is a reality where somebody like
Speaker 1: AOC would even ever potentially think about him, potentially have
Speaker 1: a chance with him. And that is the real joke here.
Speaker 1: The real joke is on Elon Musk, because he's clearly
Speaker 1: enjoying having his egostroked by even the idea that of
Speaker 1: pretend AOC would ever give him the time of day,
Speaker 1: which would never happen. So it's not all bad. I
Speaker 1: do have a little positive news, what a little positive
Speaker 1: news for you, and that is Apple has just unveiled
Speaker 1: their new iPhone accessibility features, which I'm very excited about. Okay,
Speaker 1: so May eighteenth with Global Accessibility Awareness Day, and to
Speaker 1: celebrate Apple unveiled a suite of new features to improve cognitive,
Speaker 1: vision and speech accessibility. We should see these features rolled
Speaker 1: out on iPhone, iPad, and Mac later this year. Apple
Speaker 1: created these tools based on feedback from a broad subsection
Speaker 1: of users with disabilities. Let's take a look at what
Speaker 1: is to come. So for users who are blind or
Speaker 1: have low vision, they have detection Mode and Magnifier which
Speaker 1: now offers point and Speak, which identifies texts that users
Speaker 1: point toward and reads it out loud to help them
Speaker 1: interact with physical objects, which just household appliances, which I
Speaker 1: think is great. And they also have a much more
Speaker 1: simplified grid home screen, so if you're somebody who doesn't
Speaker 1: necessarily need a half a dozen apps on your home screen,
Speaker 1: you just want to be able to like push one
Speaker 1: button and make a phone call, it's a lot simpler.
Speaker 1: So I love this because you know, I'm sure I've
Speaker 1: talked about this on the show before, but accessibility tools
Speaker 1: don't just benefit people with disabilities, they benefit everybody because
Speaker 1: we're all better served when more folks can show up
Speaker 1: online and in technology. My parents are both huge iPhone people.
Speaker 1: They love their iPhone. They always get the newest one
Speaker 1: my dad is disabled and after he had a stroke,
Speaker 1: he had to kind of relearn how to do a
Speaker 1: lot of things that he was in physical therapy to
Speaker 1: re learn how to walk, he had to learn how
Speaker 1: to drive. And one of the most complicated things or
Speaker 1: difficult thing for him to relearn was technology. I don't know,
Speaker 1: I don't know why it was so difficult, but like
Speaker 1: it was a real challenge. Like there's so much technology
Speaker 1: right now and it can be so complicated. And I
Speaker 1: think they like the simplified phone grid home screen will
Speaker 1: be a real hit with him because he's not somebody
Speaker 1: who is, like, you know, doing a million things on
Speaker 1: his phone. He wants to text and he wants to
Speaker 1: make phone calls, and so having it be a lot
Speaker 1: more simplified, I think will be really good. Technology has
Speaker 1: really helped both of my parents just be able to
Speaker 1: show up more. You know, my dad's Apple Watch, it
Speaker 1: monitors his vital signs. My mom facetimes her niece every
Speaker 1: single day, sometimes multiple times a day. I'll say, it
Speaker 1: is not without friction in our healthhold because my mom
Speaker 1: loves FaceTime and no longer uses just regular, good old
Speaker 1: fashioned phone calls, and so every time that we speak.
Speaker 1: She expects it to be FaceTime, and I don't really
Speaker 1: like FaceTime. I don't enjoy being on FaceTime. It's not
Speaker 1: how I want to have every conversation. So it's not
Speaker 1: it's not without friction, but it's been it's been great
Speaker 1: for them, And I also think it's like it's just
Speaker 1: a good I like tech being designed with accessibility at
Speaker 1: its core, because it is very easy to think of
Speaker 1: technology as like just cutting it stuff for young people,
Speaker 1: but that can be so limiting, you know, when tech
Speaker 1: should be designed with slash four people who need it.
Speaker 1: And I think it's really cool to see technology being
Speaker 1: made that centers older folks and folks with accessibility needs.
Speaker 1: I think that's really really cool, and I think it
Speaker 1: really reminds us like who tech is supposed to serve
Speaker 1: and who should be centered in the technology that we
Speaker 1: use every day. So I love this. I think it's great.
Speaker 2: This is really nice. Thank you for bringing this to
Speaker 2: us because you're a yeah, this is such a nice story.
Speaker 2: Thank you for sharing it. It's so nice to see
Speaker 2: technology doing what it does when it's at its best,
Speaker 2: which is helping people who either have a disability or
Speaker 2: some sort of need meet that need and be able
Speaker 2: to use it as a tool to help them do
Speaker 2: the things that they want to do. That is uh,
Speaker 2: that's about as good as it gets.
Speaker 1: With tech and added bonus with a simplified iPhone screen,
Speaker 1: maybe my parents won't be calling me every five seconds
Speaker 1: asking me to do things on their phone. So way
Speaker 1: to foster a sense of independence for my parents. Specifically,
Speaker 1: Thank you Apple.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well that's what it's all about. That's why you've
Speaker 2: been doing this show to get us here so your
Speaker 2: parents stop asking you for tech support.
Speaker 1: Yes, we did listen you. I don't know if they
Speaker 1: give you a similar situation, but when you visit your parents,
Speaker 1: it's like you'll have the dinner, you'll have the drink, whatever,
Speaker 1: and then there's like a lull in the conversation and
Speaker 1: tech support time starts where it's just like, oh, I've
Speaker 1: got this problem with my computer, Like, oh, the the
Speaker 1: Internet is being weird. I need you to fix it.
Speaker 1: Our what's our Wi Fi password? XC five three four
Speaker 1: beat beat five four, beat me blake, like make it
Speaker 1: something you gonna remember and say.
Speaker 2: In my with my parents, we have really establish some
Speaker 2: good boundaries around my providing tech support. It took us
Speaker 2: a while to get here. It was a bumpy road,
Speaker 2: but yeah, I empathize, and so maybe Apple will solve
Speaker 2: all those problems for you and your parents.
Speaker 1: Let that be a lesson to you listeners. If you
Speaker 1: are struggling with parents that need a lot of tech support,
Speaker 1: it gets better.
Speaker 2: Yeah, all you need to do is create a podcast
Speaker 2: about the future technology and for seasons in Apple will
Speaker 2: release a feature that helps your parents.
Speaker 1: You know, it's an easy it's not easy, but you
Speaker 1: know it's it's it's it's a template. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Thanks, so yeah, thanks for having me here on the
Speaker 2: last ever episode of their No Girls on the Internet.
Speaker 2: You can back it up and go home, bop it
Speaker 2: get all right.
Speaker 1: Well, thanks for being here, Mike, and thanks for listening.
Speaker 1: If you want to hear more content like this ad free,
Speaker 1: please subscribe to our patreon their stuff there. It's cool.
Speaker 1: I promise. I'm trying to message everybody who has subscribed
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Speaker 1: Got a story about an interesting thing in tech, or
Speaker 1: just want to say hi? You can reach us at
Speaker 1: Hello at tangody dot com. You can also find transcripts
Speaker 1: for today's episode at TENG Goody dot com. There are
Speaker 1: no girls on the Internet. What was created by me,
Speaker 1: Bridget Tod. It's a production of iHeartRadio, an unboss creative
Speaker 1: edited by Joey Pat Jonathan Strickland as our executive producer.
Speaker 1: Tari Harrison is our producer and sound engineer. Michael Amado
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