WEBVTT - Tech News: Twitter Takes a Poison Pill 0:00:04.400 --> 0:00:12.560 Welcome to tech Stuff, a production from I Heart Radio. Heythren, 0:00:12.640 --> 0:00:15.840 Welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host, Jonathan Strickland. I'm 0:00:15.880 --> 0:00:18.279 an executive producer with iHeart Radio. And how the tech 0:00:18.320 --> 0:00:21.520 are you. It's time for the tech news for Tuesday, 0:00:21.920 --> 0:00:27.080 April nineteenth, twenty twenty two. And you know, it's been 0:00:27.120 --> 0:00:30.440 a whole week since we learned of Elon Musk's desire 0:00:30.520 --> 0:00:35.239 to outright purchase controlling shares of Twitter, And as Emperor 0:00:35.280 --> 0:00:41.240 Palpatine would say, everything is proceeding exactly as I have foreseen, 0:00:42.360 --> 0:00:44.840 which is, you know, a more fun way to say 0:00:45.040 --> 0:00:48.720 I told you so. You might remember last week on Tuesday, 0:00:48.760 --> 0:00:51.720 I said that Musk's decision not to take a seat 0:00:51.800 --> 0:00:55.000 at the board of directors at Twitter could indicate that 0:00:55.160 --> 0:00:57.600 he was actually going to try for a hostile takeover, 0:00:58.040 --> 0:01:01.040 you know, that kind of situation, And then the next 0:01:01.080 --> 0:01:03.960 day we learned that's exactly what he was doing. Then 0:01:04.000 --> 0:01:07.759 you might remember on last Thursday, I said that Twitter's 0:01:07.800 --> 0:01:10.800 board of directors might choose a pathway to foil that 0:01:10.880 --> 0:01:15.240 plan by implementing a poison pill strategy, and sure enough, 0:01:16.080 --> 0:01:18.640 that's what they did. So look at me, I can 0:01:18.680 --> 0:01:21.240 see the future except, of course, I think pretty much 0:01:21.560 --> 0:01:24.000 anyone paying any attention to this would have come to 0:01:24.080 --> 0:01:28.760 the same conclusion. So really I'm nothing special. Anyway. You 0:01:28.840 --> 0:01:32.080 might wonder what the heck a poison pill is, and 0:01:32.120 --> 0:01:35.920 there's actually a couple of different versions of it, but 0:01:36.200 --> 0:01:39.319 the one that Twitter looks to be employing looks like 0:01:39.360 --> 0:01:41.520 a flip in poison pill to me. I'd have to 0:01:41.560 --> 0:01:44.800 actually read more about it to find out. But this 0:01:44.880 --> 0:01:48.560 is where a company seeing that's in danger of being 0:01:48.560 --> 0:01:52.680 acquired ends up offering up new shares of stock to 0:01:52.800 --> 0:01:57.680 existing shareholders, but they exclude the party that's actually trying 0:01:57.680 --> 0:02:00.680 to acquire the company. So they're saying, hey, we've got 0:02:00.720 --> 0:02:03.440 new shares and you can buy them in discount, so 0:02:03.600 --> 0:02:06.080 you can buy them cheaper than what they're going for 0:02:06.200 --> 0:02:08.720 on the market. That gets a live shareholders to buy 0:02:08.800 --> 0:02:13.200 up shares. That dilutes the would be acquirers ownership. Right, 0:02:13.560 --> 0:02:15.960 You've got more shares of the stuff going out there, 0:02:15.960 --> 0:02:18.960 but the acquirer can't get hold of them, so their 0:02:19.120 --> 0:02:23.040 steak in elon Musk's case, we're talking around nine two 0:02:23.760 --> 0:02:28.800 starts to get smaller because there's more, there's more pie 0:02:28.840 --> 0:02:31.200 out there and they're not allowed to get any more 0:02:31.200 --> 0:02:34.680 of the pie. This also can have a big impact 0:02:34.720 --> 0:02:37.480 on the value of the stocks themselves, and in the 0:02:37.520 --> 0:02:40.240 short term, it can make it way more expensive to 0:02:40.320 --> 0:02:43.720 complete a takeover. And Musk has already kind of given 0:02:43.760 --> 0:02:49.240 his um his his final bid of what he will spend. 0:02:49.720 --> 0:02:51.679 But you know, if he has to buy even more 0:02:51.800 --> 0:02:55.160 shares of stock in order to get that controlling interest, 0:02:55.840 --> 0:02:57.600 that it's going to cost him more because there are 0:02:57.600 --> 0:03:01.880 more shares out there now. Usk has in return tweeted 0:03:01.919 --> 0:03:05.360 that should his acquisition succeed, one of the first moves 0:03:05.360 --> 0:03:08.200 he's gonna make is he's going to reduce the salary 0:03:08.440 --> 0:03:12.720 of the board of directors to zero dollars. Yeah, this 0:03:12.760 --> 0:03:15.840 is kind of a knockdown, drag out, ugly business fight 0:03:15.880 --> 0:03:18.679 in the tech space. Uh, still too early to say 0:03:18.680 --> 0:03:22.880 exactly what's gonna happen. I would be surprised if the 0:03:22.919 --> 0:03:26.799 acquisition goes through. I would actually be surprised if Elon 0:03:26.880 --> 0:03:30.000 Musk is really sincere about going after it. But I 0:03:30.040 --> 0:03:32.880 don't know the man, and um it could very well 0:03:32.919 --> 0:03:36.720 be that this is legit what he wants to do. 0:03:37.240 --> 0:03:41.680 Bloomberg reports that Tesla's factory in Shanghai is really shifting 0:03:41.720 --> 0:03:44.840 into a higher gear pun intended, and this is in 0:03:44.880 --> 0:03:48.040 the wake of shutdowns in the region due to COVID. 0:03:48.400 --> 0:03:51.240 Now you might remember that China takes a pretty drastic 0:03:51.280 --> 0:03:55.680 approach to addressing COVID outbreaks. The government forces entire regions 0:03:55.720 --> 0:03:59.520 to shut down and isolate. That includes regions that host 0:03:59.640 --> 0:04:04.440 massive industrial facilities like the Shanghai Tesla facility, which was 0:04:04.520 --> 0:04:07.960 closed for three weeks because of COVID. So now the 0:04:08.000 --> 0:04:10.800 bosses at the factory are looking at a way to 0:04:11.120 --> 0:04:14.680 make up for lost time and also to prevent future shutdowns, 0:04:15.040 --> 0:04:18.240 and they are doing this by forcing employees to stay 0:04:18.360 --> 0:04:22.440 in the factory for several weeks all the time, like 0:04:22.480 --> 0:04:25.560 they're not allowed to go home, so that includes sleeping 0:04:25.720 --> 0:04:28.960 at the factory. Reportedly, the company has been handing out 0:04:29.160 --> 0:04:32.880 mattresses and sleeping bags to employees and they will have 0:04:32.960 --> 0:04:36.520 to stay on the premises. Now, presumably this is also 0:04:36.600 --> 0:04:39.280 to head off the possibility of another outbreak, because if 0:04:39.320 --> 0:04:41.720 one does occur in Shanghai, while the factory would then 0:04:41.800 --> 0:04:44.320 have to shut down, but by having all of its 0:04:44.400 --> 0:04:47.719 employees already at the factory, they can just shut down 0:04:47.720 --> 0:04:50.880 in place and just keep on producing cars even while 0:04:50.880 --> 0:04:54.760 the rest of the region is on lockdown. UM as 0:04:54.800 --> 0:04:58.880 for the employees, you know, quality of life, I guess 0:04:58.920 --> 0:05:02.320 it's not all bad. They will have designated places where 0:05:02.320 --> 0:05:04.880 they're allowed to sleep on the floor of the shiny 0:05:04.920 --> 0:05:09.400 Tesla factory. Uh. They'll also have access to shower facilities. 0:05:09.760 --> 0:05:11.640 They will get three meals a day, and they will 0:05:11.680 --> 0:05:16.360 get an allowance equivalent to about sixty dollars a day luxury. 0:05:16.760 --> 0:05:19.880 I'm being a bit facetious here. Tesla initiated the plan 0:05:20.040 --> 0:05:23.000 yesterday and they will continue to force employees to live 0:05:23.040 --> 0:05:27.799 at the factory until at least May first. Oh brave 0:05:27.880 --> 0:05:32.839 New world to have such corporations in it. And news 0:05:32.880 --> 0:05:37.120 related to electric vehicles are j Scaringe, the CEO of 0:05:37.160 --> 0:05:43.200 the electric adventure vehicle company Rivian, has echoed concerns that 0:05:43.360 --> 0:05:47.600 Elon Musk made a few months ago, so really repeating 0:05:47.640 --> 0:05:50.000 something that Musk has already said, which is that the 0:05:50.040 --> 0:05:53.400 world's ability to produce batteries that are suitable for electric 0:05:53.480 --> 0:05:57.080 vehicles is way behind what demand is going to be 0:05:57.200 --> 0:06:00.320 in just a few years. As governments around the world 0:06:00.320 --> 0:06:03.440 are passing legislation that will ban the sale of new 0:06:03.480 --> 0:06:07.040 internal combustion engine vehicles in the not too distant future. 0:06:07.640 --> 0:06:10.520 The general assumption is that electric vehicles are going to 0:06:10.560 --> 0:06:15.039 take their place. But electric vehicles need batteries, and right now, 0:06:15.080 --> 0:06:19.279 the world just doesn't produce that many of them, certainly 0:06:19.320 --> 0:06:22.880 not enough to meet global demand assuming a shift to 0:06:23.200 --> 0:06:27.400 E VS from I sees, that is, electric vehicles from 0:06:27.720 --> 0:06:31.719 internal combustion engine vehicles. Now. Our j told The Wall 0:06:31.720 --> 0:06:36.200 Street Journal that, quote, the world's cell production combined represents 0:06:36.240 --> 0:06:38.720 well under ten percent of what we will need in 0:06:38.839 --> 0:06:42.960 ten years end. Quote. So this point is, unless there's 0:06:43.040 --> 0:06:47.120 a massive change, including huge investments in production, and that's 0:06:47.120 --> 0:06:51.360 going to involve everything from mining the raw materials to 0:06:51.839 --> 0:06:57.039 manufacturing the batteries themselves. Unless there's this massive increase across 0:06:57.120 --> 0:07:00.479 the board, we are going to encounter a supply change 0:07:00.480 --> 0:07:05.160 shortage that makes the semiconductor crisis look quaint by comparison. 0:07:05.880 --> 0:07:09.120 The demand for vehicles will still be very high, but 0:07:09.240 --> 0:07:12.360 supply will be insufficient. Like if you're in a world 0:07:12.840 --> 0:07:15.920 where you can't sell internal combustion engine vehicles and it 0:07:15.960 --> 0:07:18.640 has to be an electric vehicle, but you're only able 0:07:18.800 --> 0:07:24.160 to produce ten of the electric vehicle batteries needed to 0:07:24.360 --> 0:07:28.400 meet the world's demand. You could easily imagine that vehicle 0:07:28.480 --> 0:07:33.040 prices would hit the stratosphere. I mean, demand is always 0:07:33.080 --> 0:07:35.720 going to be intense, people are always going to need vehicles, 0:07:36.040 --> 0:07:39.679 Supply will be very very low. That means that even 0:07:39.720 --> 0:07:42.160 a simple car like one that doesn't have a lot 0:07:42.200 --> 0:07:45.560 of bells and whistles on it could be well beyond 0:07:45.840 --> 0:07:51.360 the purchasing range of most people. And so people like 0:07:51.520 --> 0:07:54.120 Musk and r J are making the argument that while 0:07:54.160 --> 0:07:58.120 a change to e VS makes sense from an environmental standpoint, 0:07:58.280 --> 0:08:00.600 like it makes sense for us to get off of 0:08:00.640 --> 0:08:05.520 internal combustion engine vehicles, there's no denying that there are 0:08:05.560 --> 0:08:09.280 still practical challenges that we have to acknowledge and tackle 0:08:09.960 --> 0:08:11.920 if we are going to make it happen. So, in 0:08:11.920 --> 0:08:14.360 other words, it's not this is a bad idea, but 0:08:14.520 --> 0:08:20.080 rather this is unsupportable unless we figure something out. Otherwise 0:08:20.120 --> 0:08:22.200 we're just going to be in a different crisis of 0:08:22.200 --> 0:08:26.960 our own making. In our ongoing coverage of how the 0:08:27.040 --> 0:08:30.000 labor movement in the United States is affecting the tech sector, 0:08:30.400 --> 0:08:33.960 the Washington Post reports that employees at the main Apple 0:08:34.000 --> 0:08:37.199 store in New York City have begun to circulate petitions 0:08:37.360 --> 0:08:40.920 in an effort to unionize. The employees leading the effort 0:08:40.920 --> 0:08:45.720 have taken the quaint name fruit Stand Workers United, because 0:08:45.800 --> 0:08:52.040 you know Apple fruit Stand cute. Among the employees, concerns 0:08:52.080 --> 0:08:56.120 are that pay has remained stagnant even as inflation increases, 0:08:56.200 --> 0:09:01.480 which just means that employees are effectively earning less over time. Also, 0:09:01.920 --> 0:09:05.120 they claim that employees have been subjected to quote unquote 0:09:05.200 --> 0:09:09.600 unfair or abusive practices. The process of forming a union 0:09:09.760 --> 0:09:14.640 requires several steps. First, the employees have to collect signatures. 0:09:14.920 --> 0:09:18.520 This is getting people to sign a union card, and 0:09:18.600 --> 0:09:22.000 at least of the employees at the store would have 0:09:22.080 --> 0:09:25.679 to sign a card. They would then submit those signed 0:09:25.679 --> 0:09:29.240 cards to the National Labor Relations Board, which would then 0:09:29.280 --> 0:09:33.040 authorize a vote for the employees to to hold about 0:09:33.120 --> 0:09:35.800 whether or not to form a union. UH This would 0:09:35.840 --> 0:09:38.599 take a majority vote for the n l r B 0:09:38.800 --> 0:09:42.120 two back an employee union. Apple would then have to 0:09:42.240 --> 0:09:45.520 either acknowledge the union or try to fight back and 0:09:45.559 --> 0:09:48.840 refuse to acknowledge it, at which point the employees would 0:09:48.840 --> 0:09:50.599 likely have to lean on the n l r B 0:09:51.000 --> 0:09:54.240 to support them in order to force Apple's hand and 0:09:54.360 --> 0:09:58.640 accept the union's existence. Now, according to the Post employees. 0:09:58.720 --> 0:10:01.360 At least a few other app stores are also exploring 0:10:01.360 --> 0:10:05.080 the possibility of forming unions. So, like I've said several 0:10:05.120 --> 0:10:07.680 times in the recent past, it does look like we're 0:10:07.679 --> 0:10:11.000 seeing a bit of a labor movement in the US 0:10:11.080 --> 0:10:14.520 these days. We've got more to say about labor and 0:10:14.559 --> 0:10:17.480 tech and lots of other stuff, including some cool science 0:10:17.520 --> 0:10:20.360 fiction e stuff. But first, let's take a quick break 0:10:28.400 --> 0:10:32.160 over at Amazon. The company has a court mandate ordering 0:10:32.200 --> 0:10:36.280 them to reinstate Gerald Bryson. So two years ago, Bryson 0:10:36.360 --> 0:10:40.640 protested working conditions in the Staten Island fulfillment center where 0:10:40.640 --> 0:10:44.640 he worked. He argued that conditions in the facility were unsafe, 0:10:44.760 --> 0:10:48.560 particularly due to COVID, because this was just as COVID 0:10:48.600 --> 0:10:52.000 was starting to become a major thing, and that he 0:10:52.080 --> 0:10:54.880 and his fellow co workers were in danger working in 0:10:54.920 --> 0:11:00.560 those conditions. Amazon subsequently terminated his employment, and Bryson brought 0:11:00.559 --> 0:11:04.400 a lawsuit against the company and argued that the grounds 0:11:04.440 --> 0:11:08.720 for termination were purely retaliatory for his protest. So, in 0:11:08.760 --> 0:11:11.080 other words, it was the company striking back at him 0:11:11.200 --> 0:11:14.719 for bringing attention to these matters, and that's against the 0:11:14.800 --> 0:11:18.600 law here in the United States. The court agreed with Bryson. 0:11:18.840 --> 0:11:22.800 They ruled that Amazon had unfairly fired him in retaliation 0:11:22.880 --> 0:11:27.240 for his protest, and Judge Benjamin W. Green has ordered 0:11:27.280 --> 0:11:31.280 Amazon to reinstate Bryson to his former position, as well 0:11:31.320 --> 0:11:34.720 as pay him back pay owed to him because he 0:11:34.800 --> 0:11:38.040 should have been employed that whole time, since the termination 0:11:38.200 --> 0:11:41.800 was unjust. Bryson worked at the same facility in Staten 0:11:41.800 --> 0:11:45.120 Island that recently held its own successful push to unionize, 0:11:45.520 --> 0:11:48.040 so again ties into what we were talking about before 0:11:48.080 --> 0:11:51.760 the break. Amazon also released a statement last week two 0:11:51.800 --> 0:11:55.240 shareholders announcing that it has hired a law firm that's 0:11:55.320 --> 0:11:58.640 led by Lauretta Lynch, a former U. S Attorney General, 0:11:58.920 --> 0:12:01.800 to conduct an awe it on the company's policies and 0:12:01.840 --> 0:12:06.080 practices with regard to how they affect racial equity. However, 0:12:06.600 --> 0:12:11.160 Amazon's current plan only focuses on hourly employees. It does 0:12:11.200 --> 0:12:15.680 not cover salaried employees. Current and former employees who have 0:12:15.720 --> 0:12:19.839 filed lawsuits against Amazon arguing that you know Amazon's work 0:12:20.200 --> 0:12:24.280 place conditions have led to things like racist treatment. They 0:12:24.320 --> 0:12:27.080 say that Amazon's plan is not enough. In fact, some 0:12:27.160 --> 0:12:30.280 of those employees are or were salaried ones, and they 0:12:30.280 --> 0:12:34.280 point out that their cases, their complaints wouldn't register in 0:12:34.320 --> 0:12:37.800 such an audit, they wouldn't count, and that Amazon's plan 0:12:37.960 --> 0:12:41.560 was designed specifically to limit the damage the audit might do. 0:12:42.160 --> 0:12:46.440 In addition, the plan won't extend to employees at places 0:12:46.480 --> 0:12:50.880 like Whole Foods Market. It's just that the Amazon facilities 0:12:50.920 --> 0:12:54.400 themselves and Amazon reps say that the audit will cover 0:12:54.520 --> 0:12:57.360 the largest part of the company's workforce. That you know, 0:12:57.440 --> 0:13:01.640 the hourly workforce makes the vast majority already of Amazon's payroll, 0:13:02.120 --> 0:13:06.000 so this is a good audit. Critics, however, claim that 0:13:06.320 --> 0:13:08.520 it's really Amazon's way to have a little bit of 0:13:08.600 --> 0:13:11.760 damage control. Um. I'm sure the truth is somewhere in 0:13:11.760 --> 0:13:14.120 the middle, and we'll have to wait to see what 0:13:14.280 --> 0:13:21.840 the audit uncovers. Janko Ritger's of Protocol reports that Amazon 0:13:21.960 --> 0:13:24.280 has a couple of job listings that might indicate the 0:13:24.280 --> 0:13:29.520 company's foray into mixed or extended reality endeavors. One such 0:13:29.600 --> 0:13:32.880 listing says the employee will work on creating extended reality 0:13:32.920 --> 0:13:37.240 concepts that will eventually at least coalesce into a product 0:13:37.240 --> 0:13:40.439 of some sort, but no other real details were mentioned. 0:13:40.480 --> 0:13:42.240 I guess that makes sense. I mean, you don't want 0:13:42.280 --> 0:13:45.400 to spell everything out in a job listing, but the 0:13:45.440 --> 0:13:49.559 listings in general indicate the Amazon is interested in developing, producing, 0:13:49.600 --> 0:13:53.120 and marketing those kinds of devices. So we're talking about 0:13:53.120 --> 0:13:56.560 stuff that could be virtual reality or augmented reality or 0:13:56.679 --> 0:14:00.240 something in between. And since everyone is gung ho for 0:14:00.280 --> 0:14:03.240 the metaverse, this should not come as a huge surprise. 0:14:03.720 --> 0:14:06.560 The vision of the metaverse includes the back end, which 0:14:06.559 --> 0:14:09.920 is the actual stuff we will encounter as we navigate 0:14:09.960 --> 0:14:12.760 through the metaverse. But then you also have the front end, 0:14:12.800 --> 0:14:15.679 the technology that we will be using to access the 0:14:15.679 --> 0:14:19.080 metaverse in the first place. Right now, companies like Meta 0:14:19.160 --> 0:14:22.400 are way in the lead on that front, having at 0:14:22.480 --> 0:14:26.400 least reached modest success with their VR products. A R 0:14:26.520 --> 0:14:28.840 has had a bit of a tougher go, partly because 0:14:29.480 --> 0:14:32.640 the really cool stuff has it made it to the 0:14:32.680 --> 0:14:36.520 consumer market. I mean, I think the Microsoft hollow lens 0:14:36.600 --> 0:14:39.720 demonstrations I saw. I never got to try one myself, 0:14:39.760 --> 0:14:42.600 I only got to see videos of them. Those demonstrations 0:14:42.600 --> 0:14:45.120 were super nifty. I thought they were really cool. But 0:14:45.240 --> 0:14:49.640 Microsoft has kind of held that tech back from consumer technology. Uh, 0:14:49.720 --> 0:14:53.800 they market it to companies for all sorts of official purposes, 0:14:53.840 --> 0:14:57.800 like for training and for engineering and that kind of stuff, 0:14:57.920 --> 0:15:00.440 which makes sense, but you know, I really want to 0:15:00.480 --> 0:15:03.000 get my grubby little hands on the thing. Plus, one 0:15:03.040 --> 0:15:07.320 of the demos they showed off included a Minecraft demo, 0:15:07.520 --> 0:15:10.320 and come on, you're gonna show off Minecraft. It's got 0:15:10.320 --> 0:15:15.200 to become a consumer technology, right Anyway, I wouldn't say 0:15:15.200 --> 0:15:18.800 that Amazon getting into this space really comes as a surprise. 0:15:19.200 --> 0:15:21.680 It's just interesting to see confirmation in the form of 0:15:21.760 --> 0:15:24.720 job listings. As for what kind of timeline we should 0:15:24.760 --> 0:15:28.280 expect before we start seeing Amazon branded mixed reality systems, 0:15:28.920 --> 0:15:31.520 I would guess that's gonna take a couple of years 0:15:31.640 --> 0:15:35.760 at least, because I mean, you know, starting from ideation 0:15:36.240 --> 0:15:41.400 to production, it takes some time. Business Insider ran an 0:15:41.480 --> 0:15:45.280 article about a former TikTok Global account director named Pabo 0:15:45.440 --> 0:15:48.560 Martinez that gives a bit of insight into how the 0:15:48.600 --> 0:15:53.440 company does business, and it ain't pretty so. According to Martinez, 0:15:53.840 --> 0:15:59.200 employees at TikTok corporate headquarters are encouraged, which I often 0:15:59.240 --> 0:16:02.920 find is really a euphemism to mean they were directed 0:16:03.320 --> 0:16:07.080 to work very long hours and even attend work meetings 0:16:07.720 --> 0:16:12.160 on weekends so on their days off. Now, Martinez referred 0:16:12.160 --> 0:16:16.520 to this as adhering to the nine nine six culture, 0:16:17.000 --> 0:16:20.760 and nine is in reference to a pretty brutal work 0:16:20.840 --> 0:16:24.120 schedule that a lot of Chinese companies, particularly in the 0:16:24.160 --> 0:16:27.680 tech sector, followed, and I guess some of them still do. 0:16:28.840 --> 0:16:33.840 So means you start your work day at nine am 0:16:33.880 --> 0:16:36.680 and you work until nine pm, and you do that 0:16:36.960 --> 0:16:41.480 six times a week, nine nine six. If you think 0:16:41.480 --> 0:16:44.520 that sounds horrible, you're right. In fact, it was bad 0:16:44.640 --> 0:16:48.680 enough in China that ultimately the Chinese Supreme Court declared 0:16:48.760 --> 0:16:52.800 that it was an illegal practice. Whether or not companies 0:16:52.800 --> 0:16:56.320 have actually stopped doing that, I don't know, but you 0:16:56.320 --> 0:17:00.760 know they're supposed to. And apparently that kind of merciless 0:17:00.800 --> 0:17:04.120 approach to work and the complete denial of a work 0:17:04.160 --> 0:17:08.040 life balance filtered down through Bite Dance, which is the 0:17:08.119 --> 0:17:11.840 Chinese company that is the parent company to TikTok, and 0:17:11.880 --> 0:17:17.840 it's saturated into the TikTok work culture. Now, considering that 0:17:17.880 --> 0:17:21.440 the narrative TikTok has been pushing for years is that 0:17:21.600 --> 0:17:25.080 TikTok is really an American company and that it has 0:17:25.200 --> 0:17:29.720 very little connective tissue to its Chinese parent company, I 0:17:29.720 --> 0:17:33.200 would say this revelation ain't exactly good news for TikTok. 0:17:33.840 --> 0:17:38.399 The company has constantly had to deny that it is 0:17:38.480 --> 0:17:42.680 filtering information data back to Bite Dance, and that in fact, 0:17:42.720 --> 0:17:46.120 it could be seen as sort of a surveillance company 0:17:46.280 --> 0:17:50.600 on behalf of China. That's an accusation the company has 0:17:50.760 --> 0:17:53.560 denied for a long time. But if it turns out 0:17:53.600 --> 0:17:57.159 that they are employing practices that are very similar to 0:17:57.280 --> 0:18:03.480 Chinese work culture practices, that raises some doubts, right uh. 0:18:03.520 --> 0:18:05.800 And even if it were to turn out that there 0:18:05.800 --> 0:18:08.520 were no directives coming down from Bite Dance, that no 0:18:08.560 --> 0:18:11.360 one from Bite Dance was telling TikTok, hey, you need 0:18:11.440 --> 0:18:15.560 to institute these work practices. There's been a lot of 0:18:15.560 --> 0:18:19.359 pushback against this kind of thing lately here in the US. 0:18:19.400 --> 0:18:22.080 I mean, we've seen it in the video game industry 0:18:22.080 --> 0:18:28.040 in particular, where there's a real effort to eliminate crunch. Uh. 0:18:28.119 --> 0:18:32.000 That also happens in other kinds of production. So I 0:18:32.040 --> 0:18:35.880 think it's just a bad, bad look for TikTok, as 0:18:35.920 --> 0:18:39.120 the kids say, so, we'll have to wait and see 0:18:39.160 --> 0:18:41.919 if TikTok has a response to this. As I record 0:18:41.960 --> 0:18:45.959 this episode, I have not seen one from the company. 0:18:46.440 --> 0:18:50.159 Preston Dunlap, the former Chief architect officer for the U 0:18:50.280 --> 0:18:54.080 S Department of Defense, gave an interview to Bloomberg News 0:18:54.160 --> 0:18:58.520 to explain why he decided to resign his position. Now 0:18:58.640 --> 0:19:02.200 essentially done. My apps major complaint is that the US 0:19:02.280 --> 0:19:06.440 government is so bureaucratic that it is impossible to move 0:19:06.520 --> 0:19:11.840 with any alacrity when adopting new technological strategies. You can't 0:19:11.880 --> 0:19:16.240 move fast like the Silicon Valley philosophy, at least for 0:19:16.240 --> 0:19:19.439 the longest time, has been move fast and break things. 0:19:19.960 --> 0:19:22.639 You're not allowed to do that when you're working a 0:19:22.680 --> 0:19:26.320 government job. Though, first of all, moving fast is impossible, 0:19:26.680 --> 0:19:30.960 and breaking things is really frowned upon. So Dunlap argues 0:19:31.000 --> 0:19:34.880 that the US is falling further and further behind technologically, 0:19:34.960 --> 0:19:38.280 particularly in the realm of defense, and he said, quote, 0:19:38.680 --> 0:19:42.120 by the time the government manages to produce something, it's 0:19:42.240 --> 0:19:46.240 too often obsolete end quote. Now, I could definitely see 0:19:46.280 --> 0:19:49.040 how that would be really frustrating, And in fact, we've 0:19:49.040 --> 0:19:53.400 seen manifestations of this in different aspects of politics where 0:19:53.480 --> 0:19:57.080 it intertwines with tech. It's nearly always the case that 0:19:57.160 --> 0:20:03.560 technological evolution greatly outpaces the government's pace and its capability 0:20:03.600 --> 0:20:07.720 of handling tech. So we've seen this in realms where 0:20:07.800 --> 0:20:11.119 the government has been considering passing regulations to limit the 0:20:11.160 --> 0:20:14.240 negative impact of certain technologies. By the time all that 0:20:14.280 --> 0:20:17.840 gets hashed out and signed into law, you're already onto 0:20:17.920 --> 0:20:21.200 the next thing. So it's always the government's always behind 0:20:21.359 --> 0:20:24.439 and trying to catch up. But we also see it 0:20:24.440 --> 0:20:28.560 when the government is trying to implement technology and technological solutions, 0:20:28.960 --> 0:20:30.800 same sort of thing. By the time you've gotten all 0:20:30.840 --> 0:20:34.200 the approvals and you've gotten the budget and you've you've 0:20:34.440 --> 0:20:38.000 put the team together and everybody's actually building stuff and 0:20:38.000 --> 0:20:41.000 you've got it all finished, it's already out of date. 0:20:41.560 --> 0:20:44.920 So Dunlap is not the first official to resign while 0:20:44.960 --> 0:20:49.760 citing frustrations with issues with bureaucracy. Last year, Nicholas Chiland 0:20:49.880 --> 0:20:53.119 stepped down and warned that China is pulling ahead of 0:20:53.119 --> 0:20:56.040 the United States in the field of artificial intelligence. So 0:20:56.320 --> 0:21:01.040 we've actually seen other officials make this same argument. Uh, 0:21:01.080 --> 0:21:03.080 And honestly, it's kind of hard to come up with 0:21:03.119 --> 0:21:07.439 solutions for this unless you're talking about forming departments that 0:21:07.520 --> 0:21:12.000 have way less oversight and way more freedom. But then 0:21:12.040 --> 0:21:15.480 you get into dangerous territory. As well. Right, like we've 0:21:15.520 --> 0:21:21.240 all seen and read and experienced media that's all about 0:21:22.200 --> 0:21:25.760 some secret department that doesn't have oversight and all the 0:21:25.880 --> 0:21:28.879 terrible things that it can do. Uh. That is a 0:21:29.000 --> 0:21:31.159 risk you run when you go that way. But on 0:21:31.160 --> 0:21:36.359 the flip side, if you have endless layers of oversight, 0:21:36.760 --> 0:21:40.600 it's really hard to make any progress whatsoever. Hopefully there's 0:21:40.600 --> 0:21:44.800 some sort of middle ground there where progress can be made. 0:21:45.480 --> 0:21:49.240 And um, yet you aren't giving people free reign to 0:21:49.280 --> 0:21:53.119 be evil mad scientists. A boy can dream. All Right, 0:21:53.160 --> 0:21:55.080 we're gonna take another break. When we come back, we've 0:21:55.080 --> 0:22:05.560 got a couple more news stories stick with us. Okay. 0:22:05.640 --> 0:22:09.679 Before the break, I talked about how Preston Dunlap stepped 0:22:09.680 --> 0:22:13.080 down from the Department of Defense, citing the issues with 0:22:13.240 --> 0:22:19.879 the you know, the government uh departments adopting technological solutions. 0:22:20.320 --> 0:22:22.720 This does not mean that the US military is in 0:22:22.760 --> 0:22:25.399 the Stone Age. It is far from it. The U. S. 0:22:25.480 --> 0:22:28.520 Navy recently issued a press release revealing that back in 0:22:28.600 --> 0:22:32.520 February of this year, a trial of the layered Laser 0:22:32.720 --> 0:22:37.280 Defense System or l l D, proved successful in bringing 0:22:37.320 --> 0:22:40.440 down a high speed drone that was kind of standing 0:22:40.480 --> 0:22:43.520 in for a cruise missile. They also took down other 0:22:43.680 --> 0:22:47.960 style drones and some other targets. The laser that the 0:22:48.040 --> 0:22:51.639 Navy used is an all electric laser, which simplifies the 0:22:51.720 --> 0:22:57.440 operations compared to older chemical based laser systems. So essentially, 0:22:57.520 --> 0:23:01.640 the the weapons system would have power as long as 0:23:01.680 --> 0:23:05.359 the ship it's on is powered, and the system includes 0:23:05.440 --> 0:23:10.399 a telescopic targeting system. It's guided by artificial intelligence and 0:23:10.440 --> 0:23:14.760 can be used to attack aerial or naval targets. So 0:23:14.960 --> 0:23:17.280 now we've got our pew pew lasers that could be 0:23:17.359 --> 0:23:20.640 standard issue on US Navy vessels in the not too 0:23:20.800 --> 0:23:24.760 distant future. Uh, really useful for defense like shooting down 0:23:24.920 --> 0:23:31.320 cruise missiles or targeting military drones. Very useful kind of technology. 0:23:31.720 --> 0:23:35.080 Interesting that we've gotten to the point where we can 0:23:35.240 --> 0:23:39.199 have a powerful enough laser take down those targets that quickly, 0:23:39.280 --> 0:23:43.320 because obviously, uh, you know, the lasers that I'm familiar 0:23:43.359 --> 0:23:46.560 with are ones that would take a sustained amount of 0:23:46.560 --> 0:23:49.840 time on a target to do any real damage. Obviously, 0:23:49.880 --> 0:23:52.679 when you're talking about something like a cruise missile, the 0:23:52.880 --> 0:23:56.000 time of operation has to be super fast. So I'm 0:23:56.080 --> 0:24:00.440 very curious to learn more about the actual technicals specs 0:24:00.560 --> 0:24:04.359 of the l l D. I imagine they are terrifying. 0:24:05.040 --> 0:24:08.520 In the U S. State of Pennsylvania, legislators have introduced 0:24:08.560 --> 0:24:11.520 a measure that I hope to see deployed around the world. 0:24:11.720 --> 0:24:14.000 And it's a small thing, but it's a meaningful one 0:24:14.520 --> 0:24:18.119 and it's being called click to cancel. And this isn't 0:24:18.160 --> 0:24:21.320 about making it easier to punish people for saying and 0:24:21.440 --> 0:24:24.680 doing awful things. It's not that kind of canceling. This 0:24:24.760 --> 0:24:29.080 is actually about canceling service subscriptions. So if you're like me, 0:24:29.440 --> 0:24:32.200 you've probably got at least half a dozen different subscribed 0:24:32.280 --> 0:24:35.360 services under your belt. In fact, if I counted all 0:24:35.400 --> 0:24:37.719 the ones that I'm subscribed to, I'm sure there's at 0:24:37.800 --> 0:24:41.000 least ten or twelve, and I'm probably forgetting a few 0:24:41.040 --> 0:24:43.359 in that as well. And that's a big problem for 0:24:43.400 --> 0:24:46.719 a lot of people. Um it could be difficult just 0:24:46.840 --> 0:24:50.560 keeping track of all the subscriptions, let alone being able 0:24:50.600 --> 0:24:53.200 to get out of them if you don't want them anymore. 0:24:53.600 --> 0:24:56.400 So this legislation would require companies to make it very 0:24:56.480 --> 0:24:59.560 clear to customers that they have an active subscription to 0:24:59.600 --> 0:25:03.119 the company services. And moreover, that should be as simple 0:25:03.200 --> 0:25:07.440 as clicking and on screen option to cancel that subscription. So, 0:25:07.480 --> 0:25:10.480 in other words, you should receive regular notices about the 0:25:10.480 --> 0:25:13.399 services you're subscribed to, and you should have the option 0:25:13.480 --> 0:25:16.760 to piece out of them whenever you want. Now, considering 0:25:16.800 --> 0:25:19.240