1
00:00:02,520 --> 00:00:14,920
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news roadblocks as we've going

2
00:00:15,040 --> 00:00:18,159
Speaker 1: rolling out age verification technology for all users and is

3
00:00:18,239 --> 00:00:22,080
Speaker 1: introducing age based chat as a gaming platform, expands safety

4
00:00:22,120 --> 00:00:25,560
Speaker 1: features with further parental resources too. My bloc CEO David

5
00:00:25,600 --> 00:00:28,159
Speaker 1: Zooki joins us now and Dave. This really builds on

6
00:00:28,360 --> 00:00:30,480
Speaker 1: that big, ambitious September announcement.

7
00:00:30,880 --> 00:00:32,240
Speaker 2: How is this going to be rolling out?

8
00:00:33,520 --> 00:00:36,400
Speaker 3: Hey, great to be here and what an enormous responsibility.

9
00:00:36,440 --> 00:00:39,880
Speaker 3: With one hundred and fifty million users every day coming

10
00:00:39,920 --> 00:00:42,800
Speaker 3: to the platform, We're rolling out what we believe will

11
00:00:42,800 --> 00:00:45,680
Speaker 3: be the gold standard for the future of Internet safety,

12
00:00:45,680 --> 00:00:50,200
Speaker 3: where the first really major gaming platform to use AI

13
00:00:50,520 --> 00:00:53,680
Speaker 3: to estimate the age of everyone on the platform who

14
00:00:53,760 --> 00:00:57,440
Speaker 3: wants to use chat and communicate. We're going to start

15
00:00:57,520 --> 00:00:59,960
Speaker 3: rolling this out in December and then it'll be should

16
00:01:00,080 --> 00:01:04,760
Speaker 3: be all rolled out by January. Basically, on whatever device

17
00:01:04,800 --> 00:01:08,800
Speaker 3: you're on, take a quick image, will analyze your age

18
00:01:08,800 --> 00:01:11,720
Speaker 3: with AI, complement it with a bunch of other signals,

19
00:01:12,240 --> 00:01:15,440
Speaker 3: and use that really to figure out who who might

20
00:01:15,480 --> 00:01:18,039
Speaker 3: you be chatting with? To keep the platform more safe.

21
00:01:18,280 --> 00:01:21,080
Speaker 3: We're not going to be allowing miners, for example, to

22
00:01:21,120 --> 00:01:25,399
Speaker 3: communicate with people who are adults, and we're going to

23
00:01:25,440 --> 00:01:27,240
Speaker 3: roll it out to everyone on the platform.

24
00:01:27,680 --> 00:01:29,600
Speaker 1: I'm really interested as to how you're going to measure

25
00:01:29,640 --> 00:01:32,760
Speaker 1: success here, Dave, because in many ways you're trying to

26
00:01:32,760 --> 00:01:35,679
Speaker 1: prove a negative. But how are you going to be

27
00:01:35,720 --> 00:01:39,760
Speaker 1: internally thinking this has worked, people are satisfied and they're safe.

28
00:01:40,240 --> 00:01:43,280
Speaker 3: Well, I want to highlight things are already working in

29
00:01:43,280 --> 00:01:46,720
Speaker 3: that we're a very unique platform, and that we filter

30
00:01:46,920 --> 00:01:51,040
Speaker 3: all of the text and communication on our platform. We

31
00:01:51,160 --> 00:01:55,360
Speaker 3: don't allow the sharing of images, we have monitoring for

32
00:01:55,440 --> 00:01:59,520
Speaker 3: critical harms. We work very closely with law enforcement. So

33
00:01:59,680 --> 00:02:04,440
Speaker 3: I see this as an addition to everything we're doing

34
00:02:04,680 --> 00:02:07,560
Speaker 3: and really to our vision of what we've been calling

35
00:02:07,760 --> 00:02:10,959
Speaker 3: the gold standard. But we do estimate over the next

36
00:02:11,000 --> 00:02:14,720
Speaker 3: few months will will know roughly the age of everyone

37
00:02:14,760 --> 00:02:17,920
Speaker 3: on the platform, and we'll complement that with some of

38
00:02:17,960 --> 00:02:21,919
Speaker 3: the other things we do, like trusted connections and things

39
00:02:21,960 --> 00:02:25,440
Speaker 3: like that to constantly build on our innovation. You know,

40
00:02:25,480 --> 00:02:29,160
Speaker 3: we've shipped over one hundred safety innovations in the last year,

41
00:02:29,520 --> 00:02:31,919
Speaker 3: so it's really a continuation of that focus.

42
00:02:32,120 --> 00:02:32,680
Speaker 2: You're using a.

43
00:02:32,680 --> 00:02:35,960
Speaker 1: Third party vendor persona I believe, and how are you

44
00:02:36,080 --> 00:02:38,280
Speaker 1: going to be ensuring that that's robust enough. The AI,

45
00:02:38,360 --> 00:02:40,839
Speaker 1: the underlying technology is robust enough. Ever in the UK

46
00:02:41,480 --> 00:02:44,120
Speaker 1: well some of the using Discord, for example, managed to

47
00:02:44,120 --> 00:02:47,880
Speaker 1: bypass previous facial recognition age verification tests.

48
00:02:48,560 --> 00:02:51,639
Speaker 3: There's a bunch of other signals we have in addition

49
00:02:51,760 --> 00:02:54,760
Speaker 3: to the facial age estimation, and we do have the

50
00:02:54,800 --> 00:03:00,040
Speaker 3: ability to estimate several times if we need to so,

51
00:03:00,040 --> 00:03:02,280
Speaker 3: so in addition to using the camera to do an

52
00:03:02,320 --> 00:03:05,720
Speaker 3: age check, we have other ways to validate and putting

53
00:03:05,760 --> 00:03:09,440
Speaker 3: all of these signals together, we believe is pretty robust.

54
00:03:09,520 --> 00:03:12,760
Speaker 1: Really, what's so interesting is clearly you're here with safety

55
00:03:12,760 --> 00:03:15,360
Speaker 1: as a priority. You did mention back in the earnings

56
00:03:15,400 --> 00:03:18,400
Speaker 1: your CFO in particular that maybe you'll see some friction,

57
00:03:18,720 --> 00:03:21,480
Speaker 1: maybe the numbers, the revenue, the growth might be impacted

58
00:03:21,520 --> 00:03:24,560
Speaker 1: as people start to have to verify their age, maybe

59
00:03:24,639 --> 00:03:25,840
Speaker 1: slower to come and adopt.

60
00:03:26,160 --> 00:03:27,600
Speaker 2: Do you think that that will bear out? How will

61
00:03:27,639 --> 00:03:28,760
Speaker 2: it look longer term?

62
00:03:29,160 --> 00:03:32,920
Speaker 3: We shared this vision that we believe over ten percent

63
00:03:33,080 --> 00:03:36,240
Speaker 3: of the global gaming market, which is somewhere between a

64
00:03:36,320 --> 00:03:38,800
Speaker 3: one hundred and eighty and two hundred billion dollar market,

65
00:03:38,960 --> 00:03:41,520
Speaker 3: is going to be running on roadblocks, and in the

66
00:03:41,880 --> 00:03:45,400
Speaker 3: earnings call, we just had. We shared this amazing growth

67
00:03:45,480 --> 00:03:49,600
Speaker 3: both on bookings and daus in the seventy percent year

68
00:03:49,680 --> 00:03:53,400
Speaker 3: on year rate. Long term, we believe this is just

69
00:03:53,440 --> 00:03:56,040
Speaker 3: the right thing for the platform. We're unique in that

70
00:03:56,080 --> 00:04:00,720
Speaker 3: we have all ages. We have people under thirteen, over thirteen,

71
00:04:00,840 --> 00:04:03,920
Speaker 3: or over thirteen is growing rapidly. This is the right

72
00:04:04,040 --> 00:04:08,240
Speaker 3: long term vision and we're really optimistic about continuing our growth.

73
00:04:08,760 --> 00:04:11,240
Speaker 1: Okay, so this is the right balance from your perspective,

74
00:04:12,000 --> 00:04:14,400
Speaker 1: what do you think the data will bear out as

75
00:04:14,440 --> 00:04:17,600
Speaker 1: to the name, Well, ultimately the actual ages of people

76
00:04:17,640 --> 00:04:19,080
Speaker 1: you have using it. Do you think you have more

77
00:04:19,160 --> 00:04:21,360
Speaker 1: under thirteen's you anticipated? Do you think you have more

78
00:04:21,400 --> 00:04:22,560
Speaker 1: older users?

79
00:04:23,880 --> 00:04:27,200
Speaker 3: We can't estimate that exactly. What I can say is

80
00:04:27,240 --> 00:04:29,919
Speaker 3: that our the facial age estimation tech we're going to

81
00:04:30,000 --> 00:04:33,160
Speaker 3: use is pretty reasonable and pretty accurate. I've tried it,

82
00:04:33,760 --> 00:04:35,800
Speaker 3: some of my kids have tried it. We've tried it

83
00:04:36,120 --> 00:04:38,960
Speaker 3: within our staff meeting. So I think we're going to

84
00:04:39,000 --> 00:04:42,560
Speaker 3: find out we're reasonably close. But over time we will

85
00:04:42,640 --> 00:04:45,080
Speaker 3: get a better signal on everyone's age.

86
00:04:45,400 --> 00:04:49,159
Speaker 1: And this must be something that marketiers that those that

87
00:04:49,240 --> 00:04:50,719
Speaker 1: eventually we're buying more ads with.

88
00:04:50,800 --> 00:04:52,080
Speaker 2: Roadblocks are going to be looking at.

89
00:04:52,200 --> 00:04:55,200
Speaker 1: Is this going to help well inject some fuel to

90
00:04:55,279 --> 00:04:58,400
Speaker 1: that offering because people will feel safer about what age

91
00:04:58,400 --> 00:04:59,919
Speaker 1: group can be consuming such.

92
00:04:59,720 --> 00:05:03,680
Speaker 3: A We have shared a couple things. You know, we

93
00:05:03,760 --> 00:05:08,279
Speaker 3: don't target under eighteen already on the platform, but there's

94
00:05:08,320 --> 00:05:13,159
Speaker 3: an enormous number of older users joining the platform. We

95
00:05:13,320 --> 00:05:16,560
Speaker 3: shared in our earnings call I believe in Q four like,

96
00:05:16,640 --> 00:05:20,560
Speaker 3: we're literally earn qth running at over ten billion hours

97
00:05:20,680 --> 00:05:24,520
Speaker 3: a month of engagement. That's an amazing amount of engagement.

98
00:05:24,640 --> 00:05:28,839
Speaker 3: Our economy is primarily driven right now by our virtual

99
00:05:28,880 --> 00:05:33,080
Speaker 3: economy powered by Robucks. But advertising is a wonderful compliment,

100
00:05:33,800 --> 00:05:36,159
Speaker 3: and you're right, we're going to have a better, more

101
00:05:36,320 --> 00:05:39,520
Speaker 3: accurate estimate of everyone's age, which for a lot of

102
00:05:39,560 --> 00:05:43,279
Speaker 3: our advertisers that are starting to hop on with events

103
00:05:43,320 --> 00:05:46,640
Speaker 3: supporting all kinds of things, beauty products, movies, things like that,

104
00:05:46,960 --> 00:05:49,840
Speaker 3: they'll have a better idea of really the number of

105
00:05:49,880 --> 00:05:52,200
Speaker 3: people over eighteen on our platform.

106
00:05:52,880 --> 00:05:56,239
Speaker 1: Reblock CEO David Zooki on the latest safety updates.

107
00:05:56,279 --> 00:05:58,760
Speaker 2: We really appreciate you joining the show today. Thank you,