WEBVTT - Tech News: A Chatbot Earns an MBA (Not Really) 0:00:04.400 --> 0:00:07.800 Welcome to tech Stuff, a production from I Heart Radio. 0:00:11.840 --> 0:00:14.760 Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host, 0:00:14.920 --> 0:00:18.200 Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with I Heart Radio. 0:00:18.239 --> 0:00:20.720 And how the tech are you? It is time for 0:00:20.760 --> 0:00:26.160 the tech news for Tuesday, January twenty four. Man, we're 0:00:26.200 --> 0:00:29.280 almost out of January already, and we are going to 0:00:29.360 --> 0:00:34.400 begin with an update about open Ai. So, literally yesterday, 0:00:34.600 --> 0:00:38.519 moments after I sent the episode about open Ai, it 0:00:38.600 --> 0:00:40.960 was the story of open Ai, in case you weren't aware, 0:00:41.520 --> 0:00:44.800 I ended up seeing headlines confirming what had been rumored 0:00:44.840 --> 0:00:48.320 for a couple of weeks that Microsoft is investing big 0:00:48.360 --> 0:00:52.199 time into open Ai. While details are a little scarce, 0:00:52.440 --> 0:00:55.440 a Microsoft blog post proclaims that the two companies are 0:00:55.520 --> 0:00:58.480 entering into the third phase of their partnership and that 0:00:58.600 --> 0:01:02.320 it would be a quote multi year, multibillion dollar investment 0:01:02.480 --> 0:01:06.720 end quote for Microsoft. The general consensus is that this 0:01:06.800 --> 0:01:11.000 is Microsoft's bid to be competitive against Google, which, through 0:01:11.040 --> 0:01:15.040 its own work and various acquisitions, is also heavily invested 0:01:15.080 --> 0:01:18.280 in the field of AI research and development. Also, I 0:01:18.280 --> 0:01:20.760 imagine that all the folks who were recently notified that 0:01:20.800 --> 0:01:23.759 they were being laid off at Microsoft. We're talking about 0:01:24.000 --> 0:01:27.480 like thousands of people at this point are likely a 0:01:27.520 --> 0:01:29.840 little upset about, you know, hearing the company is going 0:01:29.880 --> 0:01:34.800 to invest billions into efforts around AI. Yeah, there have 0:01:34.800 --> 0:01:38.360 been a lot of stories about Microsoft in particular, but 0:01:38.400 --> 0:01:43.240 companies in general putting out big expenditures right after laying 0:01:43.280 --> 0:01:47.160 off tons of workers. That's never a good look. Also 0:01:47.240 --> 0:01:51.640 related to yesterday's episode is another story that Professor Christian 0:01:52.000 --> 0:01:55.440 Tervish or ur Wish I'm not sure how to say 0:01:55.440 --> 0:01:58.639 his name over at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School 0:01:58.640 --> 0:02:03.000 of Business gave chat GPT, which is the open AI 0:02:03.160 --> 0:02:07.920 powered chat bought a final exam in the university's NBA 0:02:08.040 --> 0:02:13.200 program that's Masters of Business Administration. Now, I'm not sure 0:02:14.400 --> 0:02:18.840 if the fact that chat GPT passed that final exam, 0:02:19.240 --> 0:02:23.360 if that says something great about Chat GPT, or it 0:02:23.440 --> 0:02:28.560 confirms some sardonic opinions about m b a's and the 0:02:28.639 --> 0:02:33.320 difficulty of getting one. Apologies to any NBA's out there, 0:02:33.360 --> 0:02:36.000 but you know, y'all have a bad rep Now, I'm 0:02:36.000 --> 0:02:40.680 not saying that you earned that reputation. I'm just saying 0:02:40.680 --> 0:02:43.960 that reputation sure as heck exists and it mostly revolves 0:02:43.960 --> 0:02:48.000 around the perceived over reliance on jargon. Anyway, according to 0:02:48.080 --> 0:02:51.760 the professor, chat GPT scored somewhere in the low B 0:02:52.560 --> 0:02:55.280 range of the final meaning it didn't ace the test, 0:02:55.840 --> 0:02:58.800 but it did perform better than average. Now I'm doing 0:02:58.840 --> 0:03:01.000 my best to resist making a lot of jokes here. 0:03:01.080 --> 0:03:04.280 I am curious how chat GPT would do if you 0:03:04.320 --> 0:03:08.080 said to the task of creating, say a dissertation. My 0:03:08.160 --> 0:03:11.120 guess is that the gaps in its abilities would become 0:03:11.160 --> 0:03:14.000 far more apparent if that were the case. For one thing, 0:03:14.480 --> 0:03:18.239 it is absolutely terrible at citing its sources. I got 0:03:18.240 --> 0:03:21.440 a couple of Musk related topics to talk about this week. 0:03:21.880 --> 0:03:25.560 First up, Elon Musk is currently on trial for securities fraud. 0:03:26.040 --> 0:03:29.079 This is something that the SEC was onto him about 0:03:29.120 --> 0:03:32.040 a few years ago, and in fact it's over the 0:03:32.120 --> 0:03:37.040 same incident. Now the sec case that one was settled. 0:03:37.320 --> 0:03:40.880 Elon Musk agreed to pay forty million dollars to settle 0:03:40.920 --> 0:03:44.080 that matter without admitting fault, and later on he said 0:03:44.080 --> 0:03:47.920 he was browbeaten into that that course of action settling 0:03:47.920 --> 0:03:50.840 the case. Now he's been sued by a collection of 0:03:50.880 --> 0:03:53.920 Tesla investors who say that Musk's tweets back in two 0:03:53.920 --> 0:03:58.960 thousand eighteen gave false information, namely that Musk had claimed 0:03:59.200 --> 0:04:03.040 he had secured the funding necessary to take Tesla private 0:04:03.480 --> 0:04:09.000 at four dollars per share that are not insignificant amount 0:04:09.040 --> 0:04:11.520 of time was actually spending court trying to get Musk 0:04:11.560 --> 0:04:14.440 to admit that his use of the number four twenty 0:04:14.680 --> 0:04:19.039 was a joke about marijuana. But Musk did not budge 0:04:19.160 --> 0:04:21.840 on that. He said it was merely a twenty percent 0:04:22.240 --> 0:04:25.560 over the value of the stock at the time, which 0:04:25.600 --> 0:04:27.400 was a standard thing if you wanted to take a 0:04:27.440 --> 0:04:30.280 company private. That's what he argues is that if you're 0:04:30.279 --> 0:04:33.920 planning to take a company private, you have to increase 0:04:34.040 --> 0:04:41.400 the cost per share by to convince shareholders too to 0:04:41.400 --> 0:04:46.240 to deal to sell their stock at a premium, and 0:04:46.240 --> 0:04:48.799 then the company can go private. That's what Musk is saying, 0:04:49.240 --> 0:04:52.200 and that's just a coincidence that happened to before twenty. 0:04:52.400 --> 0:04:56.000 But as to the actual claim of securing funding, there 0:04:56.080 --> 0:04:57.840 was a lot more back and forth in the court 0:04:57.880 --> 0:05:00.640 about that. Musk says that he received a ventially a 0:05:00.760 --> 0:05:05.440 verbal agreement from Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund or p 0:05:05.680 --> 0:05:09.080 i F that they were going to provide funding for 0:05:09.120 --> 0:05:13.040 this uh this move of Tesla from publicly traded to 0:05:13.120 --> 0:05:16.680 private company. This is the same p i F that 0:05:16.760 --> 0:05:21.360 helped Musk by Twitter late last year. Also, the b 0:05:21.520 --> 0:05:24.640 i F represents the interests of the Saudi Prince, whom 0:05:24.680 --> 0:05:28.000 you might know as the guy who allegedly ordered journalist 0:05:28.080 --> 0:05:33.440 Jamal Kashogi to be assassinated. Anyway, Must never got any 0:05:33.480 --> 0:05:36.080 of this in writing. So the investors are claiming that 0:05:36.160 --> 0:05:40.000 Musk was misrepresenting himself in those tweets by saying that 0:05:40.080 --> 0:05:42.159 he had secured funding when in fact he had not 0:05:42.360 --> 0:05:46.440 secured funding, and that he was essentially engaging in securities 0:05:46.480 --> 0:05:51.320 fraud and market manipulation. Should he be found guilty, Must 0:05:51.360 --> 0:05:55.040 could be fined an enormous amount of money. I'll try 0:05:55.040 --> 0:05:57.960 to stay up to date with the story as it develops. 0:05:58.640 --> 0:06:01.719 Over the weekend. He on, Musk tweeted that Twitter has 0:06:01.800 --> 0:06:05.400 too many ads. Then this will soon be addressed. Also 0:06:05.680 --> 0:06:09.039 that Twitter will have a higher tier subscription level that 0:06:09.080 --> 0:06:11.440 will be completely ad free, so if you become one 0:06:11.440 --> 0:06:14.880 of the subscribers, you'll get an ad free experience on Twitter. 0:06:15.160 --> 0:06:18.920 Of course, a lot of brands have already abandoned Twitter, 0:06:19.600 --> 0:06:23.479 and ad revenues are reportedly way way down, so you 0:06:23.560 --> 0:06:26.839 might just want to, you know, wait around, because it 0:06:26.880 --> 0:06:29.960 sounds like Twitter could be ad free before long, whether 0:06:30.040 --> 0:06:34.080 you have a subscription or not. Sad Trombone, Alright, to 0:06:34.080 --> 0:06:37.560 be fair, I think the last report I said read 0:06:37.640 --> 0:06:41.200 that half of the Top one advertisers had abandoned Twitter. 0:06:41.680 --> 0:06:44.760 But this was early on in Musk's takeover, so this 0:06:44.839 --> 0:06:47.840 was like last November. It could very well be that 0:06:47.880 --> 0:06:51.279 that trend has reversed. It's hard to say because Twitter 0:06:51.360 --> 0:06:54.080 no longer has a PR department, so you don't really 0:06:54.640 --> 0:06:58.120 hear about what is going on from an ad revenue 0:06:58.120 --> 0:07:02.240 perspective very much. Reuter's reports that Apple is working with 0:07:02.279 --> 0:07:05.680 several big media partners in an effort to create content 0:07:05.800 --> 0:07:09.760 for the company's upcoming mixed reality headset. It's an x 0:07:10.040 --> 0:07:13.200 R headset, if you will. Disney is said to be 0:07:13.240 --> 0:07:16.200 one of the media companies that is dealing with Apple 0:07:16.320 --> 0:07:20.000 right now. And this is not a huge shock. Hardware, 0:07:20.080 --> 0:07:24.000 particularly mixed reality hardware, is really just a paperweight if 0:07:24.040 --> 0:07:26.840 you don't have any software to run on it. With 0:07:26.920 --> 0:07:30.280 the rumored price tag for Apple's headset being in the 0:07:30.480 --> 0:07:35.000 three thousand dollar range. I'm not sure anyone is going 0:07:35.040 --> 0:07:37.880 to be able to make a feature that is killer 0:07:38.080 --> 0:07:42.080 enough to turn this product into a best seller, Like, 0:07:42.920 --> 0:07:45.640 it has to be a really compelling use case to 0:07:45.680 --> 0:07:49.800 convince people to fork over three grand to get one 0:07:49.840 --> 0:07:53.320 of these. If you'll recall, Apple had previously planned to 0:07:53.400 --> 0:07:58.120 release augmented reality glasses, but now reportedly those plans have 0:07:58.200 --> 0:08:01.320 been put on the shelf indefinitely due to it being 0:08:01.400 --> 0:08:03.880 wicked hard to make something that fits in such a 0:08:03.920 --> 0:08:09.000 relatively small form factor and still you know, work. Instead, 0:08:09.080 --> 0:08:13.080 Apple is going the mixed reality headset route, so it's 0:08:13.120 --> 0:08:17.240 more of a combination of virtual reality and augmented reality. 0:08:17.280 --> 0:08:19.960 So you've got a display that you're looking at as 0:08:19.960 --> 0:08:24.920 opposed to transparent lenses, but the headset has outward facing 0:08:24.960 --> 0:08:28.120 cameras so you can get a pass through video feed, 0:08:28.400 --> 0:08:30.760 so you're looking at a live video feed of whatever 0:08:30.800 --> 0:08:32.800 is in front of you. Um, so it's kind of 0:08:32.800 --> 0:08:35.400 like you're looking at a live broadcast instead of at 0:08:35.440 --> 0:08:39.280 the actual world around you. While the first generation sounds 0:08:39.280 --> 0:08:41.960 like it's going to be prohibitively expensive for most of 0:08:42.000 --> 0:08:44.880 us anyway, the long term plan is to release a 0:08:45.120 --> 0:08:51.839 less expensive headset later on, perhaps, though my guess is 0:08:51.880 --> 0:08:54.440 that it would still be more than a thousand dollars 0:08:54.480 --> 0:08:58.320 based upon how expensive this first one is rumored to be. 0:08:58.880 --> 0:09:01.599 So yeah, I don't know if anyone's gonna make and 0:09:01.760 --> 0:09:06.520 experience so incredible that it's gonna convince more people to 0:09:06.679 --> 0:09:09.520 fork over three grand. I'm sure there will be some. 0:09:09.840 --> 0:09:14.319 There always are. Apple has some pretty die hard fans 0:09:14.400 --> 0:09:19.880 with a lot of discretionary income. Man, Okay, hey, remember 0:09:19.960 --> 0:09:23.640 Sam Bankman Freed a k A SBF, the co founder 0:09:23.720 --> 0:09:27.720 of former cryptocurrency exchange f t X, And you remember 0:09:27.760 --> 0:09:31.400 how f t X imploded last year and SPF was 0:09:31.440 --> 0:09:37.120 reduced to being almost penniless according to most reports. Well, personally, 0:09:37.160 --> 0:09:40.640 I would love to experience his version of being penniless, 0:09:40.720 --> 0:09:44.280 because I just read that federal prosecutors have managed to 0:09:44.400 --> 0:09:49.560 seize around seven hundred million dollars of assets belonging to 0:09:49.720 --> 0:09:54.000 SPF this month alone. And you know, I get it, 0:09:54.160 --> 0:09:57.360 SPF had millions of dollars. It's just that none of 0:09:57.400 --> 0:10:00.600 those millions of dollars were in pennies, so nically he 0:10:00.720 --> 0:10:04.960 was penniless. Now it all makes sense. Anyway, SPF is 0:10:05.440 --> 0:10:08.200 to go to trial over charges of securities fraud and 0:10:08.240 --> 0:10:12.400 similar charges this coming October. He has pled not guilty 0:10:12.480 --> 0:10:16.000 to these charges and he's currently under essentially house arrest 0:10:16.040 --> 0:10:19.080 at the moment, which, y'all, I've heard of folks who 0:10:19.160 --> 0:10:22.280 end up having to stay in jail after stealing less 0:10:22.280 --> 0:10:25.560 than a hundred bucks. This guy is accused of misappropriating 0:10:25.760 --> 0:10:28.520 billions of dollars and he gets to wait his pre 0:10:28.679 --> 0:10:31.480 trial time out at his parents house, which, believe me, 0:10:31.640 --> 0:10:35.320 is not a shack in the woods. What a world. Anyway, 0:10:35.360 --> 0:10:40.000 About half a billion dollars of the seized assets were 0:10:40.000 --> 0:10:42.800 in the form of shares for the company Robin Hood, 0:10:43.200 --> 0:10:46.040 and almost a hundred million of it happened to be 0:10:46.080 --> 0:10:49.640 in an account cash in an account with a bank 0:10:49.800 --> 0:10:53.800 that's called silver Gate. One wonders how many other places 0:10:54.080 --> 0:10:57.439 might be holding money or assets belonging to SPF. It's 0:10:57.440 --> 0:11:00.480 pretty incredible. Okay, we've got more news Rois to go, 0:11:00.520 --> 0:11:13.120 but before we get to that, let's take a quick break. Okay, 0:11:13.120 --> 0:11:16.640 we're back, and we're back to crypto currency. So Reuter's 0:11:16.640 --> 0:11:20.280 reports that Finance the largest crypto exchange in the world, 0:11:20.800 --> 0:11:23.720 and one of the factors that you know, contributed to 0:11:23.800 --> 0:11:27.640 ft x is implosion last year, has processed nearly three 0:11:28.160 --> 0:11:32.400 forty six million dollars in bitcoin transactions for a different 0:11:32.720 --> 0:11:37.839 digital currency exchange called bits lato. And you might wonder, well, 0:11:37.880 --> 0:11:41.040 why does that matter, Well, that's because US authorities have 0:11:41.120 --> 0:11:47.360 called bits lata or latto a money laundering engine, and 0:11:47.440 --> 0:11:50.439 they have arrested that company's founder, who is a guy 0:11:50.520 --> 0:11:54.920 named Ana totally leg Kodomov. And again I'm sure I'm 0:11:54.920 --> 0:11:59.480 butchering name pronunciations. So the implication is that finance was 0:11:59.520 --> 0:12:05.040 complicit in processing illegal funds. Bits Lato had heavy dealings 0:12:05.080 --> 0:12:09.640 with a dark market called Hydra, best known for dealing 0:12:09.679 --> 0:12:15.000 in illegal goods like drugs, and representatives at Binance say 0:12:15.040 --> 0:12:17.960 that Reuters has it all wrong and that Binance is 0:12:18.120 --> 0:12:20.520 very very alert when it comes to attempts to do 0:12:20.640 --> 0:12:24.760 hanky and or panky with the exchange. They have claimed 0:12:24.760 --> 0:12:28.480 that the company has instituted systems that check for possible 0:12:28.559 --> 0:12:32.520 money laundering schemes and the like, but from the Reuter's report, 0:12:32.559 --> 0:12:37.760 it sounds like these claims are perhaps not entirely convincing. Anyway, 0:12:37.920 --> 0:12:40.760 Binance has been under scrutiny for a long time, even 0:12:40.840 --> 0:12:44.560 before the ft x collapse, and I suspect that scrutiny 0:12:44.640 --> 0:12:49.040 will intensify as a result of this new development. Here 0:12:49.040 --> 0:12:52.120 in the United States, the Department of Justice is expected 0:12:52.160 --> 0:12:56.240 to sue Google over antitrust concerns. Specifically, the d o 0:12:56.320 --> 0:12:58.960 j c's Google as holding a near monopoly on the 0:12:59.040 --> 0:13:02.960 digital advertise market and that it maintains its dominant position 0:13:03.080 --> 0:13:06.920 by practicing anti competitive strategies and you know, just suppressing 0:13:06.960 --> 0:13:10.520 competition in general. Google is likely to argue, as it 0:13:10.559 --> 0:13:13.080 has in the past, that there's still a great deal 0:13:13.120 --> 0:13:17.360 of competition in the digital advertising space, with massive companies 0:13:17.400 --> 0:13:21.160 like Meta, Slash, Facebook, A, T and T, and Comcast 0:13:21.360 --> 0:13:24.319 in the mix. And I'm not sure if this lawsuit 0:13:24.360 --> 0:13:27.680 will actually go anywhere, but it is yet another indication 0:13:28.200 --> 0:13:31.080 there is currently some momentum in the US when it 0:13:31.120 --> 0:13:34.360 comes to pushing back against big companies in general and 0:13:34.480 --> 0:13:38.600 big tech in particular. Yesterday, Spotify announced that it will 0:13:38.640 --> 0:13:41.480 be cutting six percent of its workforce, which is around 0:13:41.720 --> 0:13:44.920 six hundred jobs. The company seems to be saying the 0:13:45.000 --> 0:13:47.600 same thing that we've heard from other companies within the 0:13:47.640 --> 0:13:52.520 tech space, namely that the pandemic drove business up, and 0:13:52.559 --> 0:13:56.480 so the company invested in hiring and growth, and then 0:13:56.520 --> 0:13:59.520 as things started to return to normal and business began 0:13:59.559 --> 0:14:04.360 to weigh along with macro economic factors coming into play, 0:14:04.440 --> 0:14:07.679 it became clear that this growth was more than what 0:14:07.720 --> 0:14:12.000 the company could comfortably sustain while also returning value to shareholders. 0:14:12.480 --> 0:14:16.200 So now the company is cutting back, and y'all, it's 0:14:16.200 --> 0:14:18.960 getting real tough out there with all these companies cutting 0:14:19.480 --> 0:14:22.160 jobs in the tech sector in particular. If you or 0:14:22.240 --> 0:14:24.960 someone you know has been affected by layoffs, I just 0:14:25.000 --> 0:14:28.960 want to say, I've been there. It's stinks, but I 0:14:29.000 --> 0:14:33.320 do believe in you, so hanging there and good luck. 0:14:34.280 --> 0:14:38.560 I hope it all turns out well because it it's 0:14:38.600 --> 0:14:43.240 tough and it sucks and I've been there. Yuck. So 0:14:43.360 --> 0:14:48.400 when a hacker discovers the Transportation Safety Administration a k a. 0:14:48.520 --> 0:14:52.840 The t s A has a no fly list that 0:14:53.080 --> 0:14:56.520 is on an unsecured web server, who is really to 0:14:56.640 --> 0:15:02.000 blame when they? You know published fact. The reason I 0:15:02.040 --> 0:15:05.800 ask is because Tilly Kottman, who uses the hacker handle 0:15:06.280 --> 0:15:10.960 maya Arson crime you, was tooling around on this unsecured server. 0:15:11.400 --> 0:15:13.240 She says she was doing it because she was bored, 0:15:13.720 --> 0:15:16.440 and she discovered the no fly list on this server, 0:15:16.800 --> 0:15:20.160 and that includes around one and a half million names. 0:15:20.560 --> 0:15:23.800 These are names of people who are forbidden from flying 0:15:23.920 --> 0:15:27.280 here in the US due to being either a terrorist 0:15:27.440 --> 0:15:31.840 or suspected terrorist. Now, normally this kind of list would 0:15:31.840 --> 0:15:36.320 be hidden safely away under lock and key and protected, 0:15:36.680 --> 0:15:39.080 but Tilly says she was able to gain access to 0:15:39.120 --> 0:15:42.760 the list with no resistance, which does point to a 0:15:42.800 --> 0:15:46.520 pretty massive security problem. U S authorities would like a 0:15:46.520 --> 0:15:50.160 word or actually probably a lot of words with Tilly, 0:15:50.360 --> 0:15:54.520 who's also suspected of being behind other massive hacks, including 0:15:54.560 --> 0:15:57.640 one that happened a couple of years ago where a 0:15:57.680 --> 0:16:01.960 hacker accessed more than a hundred thousand surveillance cameras belonging 0:16:02.000 --> 0:16:06.680 to Vercada. But y'all, you know it's not breaking and entering. 0:16:07.040 --> 0:16:10.040 If the front door is wide open, that's just entering 0:16:10.400 --> 0:16:14.280 and maybe also trespassing. But you get my point. And finally, 0:16:14.600 --> 0:16:16.720 I would like to tell you about a new hero 0:16:17.000 --> 0:16:20.960 of mine. His name is Brian Birmingham and he's now 0:16:21.200 --> 0:16:24.760 a former lead engineer for Blizzard. So Brian is no 0:16:24.800 --> 0:16:28.280 longer employed at Blizzard because he objected to the company's 0:16:28.480 --> 0:16:35.320 stack ranking process for evaluating employee performance. Essentially, Brian was told, 0:16:35.480 --> 0:16:39.280 as all leaders in Blizzard were told, that he had 0:16:39.320 --> 0:16:44.160 to rank the employees under his leadership along a bell curve, 0:16:44.600 --> 0:16:47.800 and that this would include about five of those employees 0:16:47.840 --> 0:16:51.200 being placed at the bottom. Because that's how bell curves work. 0:16:51.680 --> 0:16:54.440 You have to have a top percentage and you have 0:16:54.600 --> 0:16:58.560 to have a bottom percentage. Even if everyone is kicking 0:16:58.880 --> 0:17:02.400 butt and taking names at their jobs, this kind of 0:17:02.440 --> 0:17:06.520 structure requires you to single out people and say these 0:17:06.560 --> 0:17:10.080 are the bottom performers. And presumably that would then affect 0:17:10.080 --> 0:17:13.359 those employees in the form of bonus payments, and it 0:17:13.400 --> 0:17:15.439 could also serve as sort of a black mark on 0:17:15.440 --> 0:17:18.239 their employment history. It could mean that later down the 0:17:18.240 --> 0:17:21.720 line they would be prevented from getting a promotion because 0:17:22.200 --> 0:17:26.240 it would be marked that at three they were they 0:17:26.240 --> 0:17:31.160 were evaluated as being a bottom performer. Brian essentially called 0:17:31.240 --> 0:17:35.400 bs on this practice. He said, it's counterproductive and it's 0:17:35.440 --> 0:17:38.480 bound to make employees try to avoid being in that 0:17:38.520 --> 0:17:42.520 bottom five per cent, not by being better at their jobs, 0:17:42.640 --> 0:17:46.440 but perhaps by engaging in stuff like sabotage, like trying 0:17:46.440 --> 0:17:50.359 to cause other employees to fall on that bottom five instead, 0:17:50.520 --> 0:17:54.440 or they might seek out a low performing group because 0:17:54.480 --> 0:17:58.000 they could stand out as a high performer if they 0:17:58.080 --> 0:18:02.760 just sought out mediocrity, and that this is all ultimately 0:18:02.840 --> 0:18:06.159 counterproductive to the ultimate company's goals, and a lot of 0:18:06.200 --> 0:18:10.840 other companies have used and subsequently abandoned this practice, finding 0:18:10.880 --> 0:18:14.720 in fact that it is counterproductive, but Blizzard is still 0:18:14.720 --> 0:18:18.080 doing it anyway. Brian said he would not participate in this, 0:18:18.520 --> 0:18:22.439 and he was subsequently fired. He didn't intend for the 0:18:22.440 --> 0:18:25.280 story to become public news, but someone else leaked it 0:18:25.320 --> 0:18:28.200 to the media and here we are. So my hat 0:18:28.280 --> 0:18:30.440 is off to you, Brian. You stood up for those 0:18:30.480 --> 0:18:35.680 in your department, You protested an inherently flawed management system, 0:18:35.720 --> 0:18:39.440 and you set an amazing example in a company would 0:18:39.440 --> 0:18:42.359 be lucky to have you as a lead engineer. And 0:18:42.400 --> 0:18:44.800 it's my hope that you will be able to actually 0:18:44.800 --> 0:18:49.000 return to Blizzard, where you clearly enjoy working, and that 0:18:49.080 --> 0:18:51.399 you will be able to lead in an environment that 0:18:51.520 --> 0:18:57.000 doesn't pit employees against one another like it's the thunder dome. 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