Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news.
Speaker 2: Well, our next guest needs no introduction, but we're gonna
Speaker 2: give them one anyway. He's a Silicon Valley legend. He
Speaker 2: helped build PayPal. He co founded LinkedIn. He was an
Speaker 2: early investor in Facebook and Airbnb. He was the first
Speaker 2: investor in open Ai. He co founded the AI company
Speaker 2: Inflection Ai. He's on Microsoft's board. He's a partner at
Speaker 2: the VC firm Greylock Partners. He's a New York Times
Speaker 2: bestselling author, and he's also a podcast we have read Hoffmans.
Speaker 3: Great to be here. Thank you for you.
Speaker 4: As we were just talking, it's the loudest environment where
Speaker 4: we've ever done a radio show before it so hopefully
Speaker 4: it'll work.
Speaker 5: It's working so far, so far, so good.
Speaker 2: But I have to ask you, are you a real
Speaker 2: or am I talking to some sort of AI digital
Speaker 2: twin round?
Speaker 5: Well, and explain why I have to ask that question, please, So.
Speaker 4: As you as you know, I did an interview with
Speaker 4: myself where I was talking to my own digital twin
Speaker 4: read AI, and.
Speaker 3: I did it in order to kind of show that
Speaker 3: not only obviously there's a.
Speaker 4: Whole bunch of concerns, there's concerns and political and misinformation
Speaker 4: and and and a deep makes and a bunch of
Speaker 4: other stuff that are real concerns. But even here there's
Speaker 4: optimism to look at what can we shaped towards. And
Speaker 4: I wanted to show not just how that message and
Speaker 4: so I was like, okay, well let me talk to
Speaker 4: my own read AI and see how it works. And
Speaker 4: so and the reason why you asked that question, of course,
Speaker 4: and you said, well, wait a minute.
Speaker 3: That was pretty good. It was we're here in person,
Speaker 3: you can tell this is I'm the real.
Speaker 5: Sounds like this looked like you. Yes, yeah, it is
Speaker 5: like you looked.
Speaker 4: Like video audio and the words we're all AI generated.
Speaker 3: It was zero from me. It was other than mirroring off.
Speaker 4: My earlier videos, mirroring off my earlier podcast.
Speaker 5: Use your use your book to train as well.
Speaker 4: Yes, yeah, it used all everything I written to good
Speaker 4: answers the way read wouldn't answered.
Speaker 6: We're all going to have digital twins someday, and we're
Speaker 6: gonna use us.
Speaker 5: We go to the DMV for me, So I think
Speaker 5: we must.
Speaker 4: It's certainly possible. Certainly, if you're a media person, you'll
Speaker 4: have a digital twin. Certainly if you're a leader, you'll
Speaker 4: have a digital twin because it'll be used in If
Speaker 4: you're a lawyer, you'll have one because then people can
Speaker 4: talk to your digital twins and maybe at a cheaper
Speaker 4: rate the dog you are preparing for your meeting or
Speaker 4: that kind of thing. So I think it will be
Speaker 4: a stack of areas for digital twins that will be
Speaker 4: very real.
Speaker 3: But I'm not sure all eight billion people were.
Speaker 2: Also district well, so so why should this excite us
Speaker 2: and not scare us and want us to all move
Speaker 2: to bunkers.
Speaker 4: So it should be, but naturally it should both excite
Speaker 4: and scare us.
Speaker 3: The scaret is the negative is the.
Speaker 4: Scas is of political misinformation, you know, things that are
Speaker 4: going to be happening this year in the US until
Speaker 4: we're in other major elections of democracy. It should scare
Speaker 4: us because there's questions around a minute, what did someone
Speaker 4: who created a deep make of me doing something or
Speaker 4: saying something?
Speaker 3: I really am poor? Like you know, like you know
Speaker 3: how I.
Speaker 4: Think Trump is a corruption in democracy against the rule
Speaker 4: on what happens to your created I love Trump.
Speaker 3: You know that would be obviously a problem.
Speaker 4: And so there's all kinds of ways that there are
Speaker 4: real problems are So on the other hand, we will
Speaker 4: we will, as we always do with technology, to figure
Speaker 4: out how to navigate and get that not perfectly but sufficiently,
Speaker 4: and there will be great things like for example, that's
Speaker 4: part of the reason I started showing me. Hey, look here,
Speaker 4: I'm making a deep bake of myself and it's not
Speaker 4: that bad.
Speaker 6: You know, read when you sat down, I said, the
Speaker 6: conversations we have a lot of blueberg and we've written
Speaker 6: about this is here.
Speaker 5: You have Lincoln kind of the social.
Speaker 6: Media site, that kind of the social media site that
Speaker 6: seems to be clean, pure, You can stress any conversations
Speaker 6: so we can get it right. So how is that
Speaker 6: kind of a guiding for since in terms of jenai
Speaker 6: and how do you think about this? What are the guardrails?
Speaker 6: How do we regulate it?
Speaker 4: Yeah, and so the good news is the mostly frontier
Speaker 4: model companies, Microsoft, Open Ai, Google are all putting a
Speaker 4: lot of energy in that kind of making these models
Speaker 4: healthy participants within the US, but within the global kind
Speaker 4: of media ecosystem, like don't generate fake inflammation, be civil,
Speaker 4: you know, don't do hate speech, don't enabe it self harm.
Speaker 4: They all put a lot of energy and a lot
Speaker 4: of work in that, and I don't.
Speaker 3: Can invest hundreds of millions of dollars and teams one
Speaker 3: hundreds of people in order to do that.
Speaker 4: Now, one of the challenges is is that some of
Speaker 4: these models are an open source, and as an open source,
Speaker 4: someone else takes the open source model to something that's
Speaker 4: not any of that with that right, and that's part
Speaker 4: of the reason why we still have to navigate this.
Speaker 6: So you have trust so that we can navigate it
Speaker 6: correctly and safely in the future AI.
Speaker 3: So the ultimate answer is absolutely yes. That doesn't mean
Speaker 3: that there aren't.
Speaker 4: Potholes, you know, bumps in the road, under scrapes all
Speaker 4: the rest, and I guarantee you there will be those two.
Speaker 2: The US can't get Vladimir Putin not to invade in Ukraine.
Speaker 2: The world can't get him not to stop fighting there.
Speaker 2: What convinces you that we could.
Speaker 5: Get a leader like him not to use AI? Oh bad?
Speaker 3: Zero percent?
Speaker 4: Like if you said that, uh that Hooton will be
Speaker 4: using AI to disrupt the US elections, you know probably
Speaker 4: support Trump because that's his exit strategy from Ukraine.
Speaker 3: Uh, he will do that. One is no way of
Speaker 3: having it. The defense is not getting him not to
Speaker 3: do it.
Speaker 4: The defense is integrating AI in our own tech platform.
Speaker 3: I'm using our stronger AI in defects.
Speaker 2: So essentially saying, okay, well, maybe you see something on
Speaker 2: Facebook and met platforms might have developed something that says, Okay,
Speaker 2: well this isn't necessarily.
Speaker 5: Something that's true.
Speaker 3: Yes, but do you.
Speaker 5: Trust Do you trust Facebook to do that?
Speaker 3: Actually?
Speaker 5: So, and you have a deep history with the company, Yes,
Speaker 5: I have a deep.
Speaker 3: History of the company.
Speaker 4: I actually have talked to Zucker Bigger about it, and
Speaker 4: they're investing in it. I think they're making a real effort.
Speaker 4: So I think like they're really try. I'm more worried
Speaker 4: about Twitter that I am about Facebook on this matter.
Speaker 5: Okay, why are you more worried about Twitter?
Speaker 3: Well, because, looks Elon.
Speaker 5: Musk is someone you also go way beastly.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and look, Elon is a literally one of the
Speaker 4: heroes of our generation.
Speaker 3: You know, uh, Space and.
Speaker 4: Kind of Starlink and Tesla and easy just amazing, amazing, amazing.
Speaker 4: You wouldn't have any of this about it. It is
Speaker 4: so spectacular. On the other hand, before he buys Twitter,
Speaker 4: he's like, oh, we have this problem with robots and
Speaker 4: then after he bought the lot trying to get out
Speaker 4: of the and then after your body, oh what robots,
Speaker 4: and you're like, oh, the robots are still there. There's
Speaker 4: still like Internet Research Agency watching robot farms doing shit.
Speaker 3: Are you doing anything about them? I'm not hearing anything.
Speaker 5: To be fair, I did see I did see an
Speaker 5: ad on.
Speaker 2: Twitter recently with a deep bake of Jeff Bezos pushing
Speaker 2: a cryptocurrency. It's a paid ad, yes, that has showed
Speaker 2: up repeatedly in my feed obviously not a proved vice.
Speaker 4: Yes, yes, yeah, And so therefore, what are you doing
Speaker 4: about AI and j Well, you know, elon is so complex.
Speaker 6: Back from Milkin, he did a conversation with Michael Milton.
Speaker 3: He said, very important to have.
Speaker 6: Maximum seeking AI and maximum curious AI. And then it's
Speaker 6: taught not to lie nor do things that are not true.
Speaker 3: Well, walk the lock, don't just lock the dock. Well,
Speaker 3: can I ask? I'm as curious as we have.
Speaker 6: All these conversations about jen AI. How is it going
Speaker 6: to impact my life? How's it really going to impact
Speaker 6: him's life, How's it really going to impact your life?
Speaker 4: So here's a simple way of looking at all of
Speaker 4: us are going to have a personal AI assistant that
Speaker 4: it's going to be helping with us with its focus
Speaker 4: on us, right, so it'll be like, Hey, what do
Speaker 4: you need help with? Do you need help with figuring
Speaker 4: out say something like like where to go? What's entertaining
Speaker 4: to do you know in the cities and I or
Speaker 4: Oh I'm having this, I'm trying to figure out this
Speaker 4: thing with my kids. Oh, we can help you with that.
Speaker 4: Oh I'm trying to figure this medical thing. Oh I
Speaker 4: can help you with that. Oh, I'm trying to figure
Speaker 4: out I had this difficult conversation with a coworker. Oh,
Speaker 4: I'll talk to you about that. It will help us
Speaker 4: with a whole range of things, and like, for example,
Speaker 4: part of what we found an inflection was really surprising
Speaker 4: to us and very positive.
Speaker 3: Which has pides personal intelligence is.
Speaker 4: People will stay, Oh, I got these eight ingredients with
Speaker 4: my friends what should I name? Or my toaster broke
Speaker 4: and I fixed it and you're like, actually, in fact,
Speaker 4: it helps with all of that. So that's that human
Speaker 4: amplification that's helping us navigate our lives, which is the
Speaker 4: thing I guarantee will be.
Speaker 5: That I love the ingredients in the Fridge part of it.
Speaker 2: Hey, if you're just joining us, we're speaking to the
Speaker 2: REDA Hoffmann, the PayPal of LinkedIn, of open AI, of
Speaker 2: Inflection AI, of the podcast Possible. But this certainly goes
Speaker 2: on read I'm wondering about winners and losers when it
Speaker 2: comes to AI AI in terms of companies.
Speaker 5: You're on the board of Microsoft. I'm mented a couple
Speaker 5: of the.
Speaker 2: Big companies that you've invested in, that you founded. Is
Speaker 2: there a concern that we're just going to see the
Speaker 2: big companies like Microsoft, like in video, like Amazon, like
Speaker 2: meta platforms, they're going to be the only winners when
Speaker 2: it comes to AI.
Speaker 4: What I guarantee you is they're not going to be
Speaker 4: the only one. They will be winners.
Speaker 6: Right.
Speaker 4: Satia has just done a masterful job, like like remember
Speaker 4: it started with a.
Speaker 3: Million dollars deal with a five O one C three.
Speaker 4: I think in the first time in the history something
Speaker 4: like that's happening, like genius strategy from talking and I
Speaker 4: think it will be Uh, it'll across all of these companies.
Speaker 4: I think they will have strong winds going in the future.
Speaker 4: On the other hand, you know at bray Locke, we're
Speaker 4: investing a whole bunch of AI company.
Speaker 3: We do it reasonably well.
Speaker 4: We have a whole portfolio that we're excited about. And
Speaker 4: I think that the I think that it's just you
Speaker 4: don't play the same game. It's a little bit like
Speaker 4: and you said, hey, I gotta start up. I'm gonna
Speaker 4: try to make a new desktop search company. You're like, well,
Speaker 4: one of the difficults, right there is this company called Google.
Speaker 3: It's a little challenging.
Speaker 4: Okay, you know, I'm gonna make a new handset mobile
Speaker 4: phone device. You're like, oh, there's this company called a
Speaker 4: whole it's a little challenging. So you know, you don't
Speaker 4: do it that way. But there's gonna be a whole
Speaker 4: range of other AI companies.
Speaker 3: The things that will like everything from opportunities that the large.
Speaker 4: Tech companies just can't focus on, to taking interesting risk
Speaker 4: and making that risk look good and then all of
Speaker 4: a sudden building out ins and mean, so I think
Speaker 4: there's gonna be rain.
Speaker 3: The startups are well excited about ideas. We have podcasts.
Speaker 3: We have a great podcast.
Speaker 5: You have a great new podcast.
Speaker 6: Tell us about possible, Well, tell us about it, like
Speaker 6: you want to talk too.
Speaker 3: What are the conversations you want to have, so for me,
Speaker 3: it's possible.
Speaker 4: It's too much of the dialogue is about technology being
Speaker 4: dangerous to us. How we evolve this humanity, how we
Speaker 4: become better and more human.
Speaker 3: It's throd technology.
Speaker 4: It's it's clothing, it's classes, it's it's it's food, it's cooking,
Speaker 4: it's fired, it's buildings.
Speaker 3: All of this is.
Speaker 1: Technology that's helped us make us as the human names
Speaker 1: we are. AI will be saying as the whole point
Speaker 1: I'm on the Possible podcast used to say, this is
Speaker 1: how technology can help us become more human, not to go,
Speaker 1: oh my god, what's coming in technology. It's it can
Speaker 1: be great for us, and it's not that hard to shape.
Speaker 3: We just need to shape it. Whether it's AI, whether
Speaker 3: it's just the use of phones.
Speaker 4: And you know, obviously people like to talk about what
Speaker 4: social networks and they go, wow, that's going to have
Speaker 4: a talented It's like, well, look at LinkedIn. LinkedIn's work
Speaker 4: out pretty well, it's doable. It's doable, so let's do it.
Speaker 2: We don't want to end with something that everybody loves
Speaker 2: to talk about politics.
Speaker 6: We all agree.
Speaker 2: Look, you've been open about your feelings about these some Trump,
Speaker 2: do you help fund Eugene Carroll's definition of lawsuits against
Speaker 2: the former president. There are a lot of business leaders
Speaker 2: out there, some of them people you work with very closely,
Speaker 2: to say that business under a President Trump administration was
Speaker 2: better than business under a Biden administration. And that's why
Speaker 2: we're in the corner of Donald Trump when it comes
Speaker 2: to twenty twenty four.
Speaker 5: What do you say to them?
Speaker 4: So I understand the approach that Trump reason is more
Speaker 4: regulatory lightweight than Biden. And by the way, generally speaking,
Speaker 4: being more regulatory lightweight is a good thing. I try
Speaker 4: to encourage the Biden administration to do that. On the
Speaker 4: other hand, what's more fundamental is the rule of law.
Speaker 4: Business works much much better with a healthy, strong rule
Speaker 4: of law.
Speaker 3: You do not want to have leaders who are literally
Speaker 3: in a court.
Speaker 4: Like had been convicted by a court of you were
Speaker 4: slandering about your sexual assault and a jury found you guilty. Right,
Speaker 4: we should be a rule of law country first. And
Speaker 4: by the way, this is what's the business leaders. By
Speaker 4: the way, rule of law is what makes great business.
Speaker 4: That's the reason why actually Biden is a matter of
Speaker 4: president for business, even though the regulatory thing won't be
Speaker 4: exactly what you.
Speaker 3: Want, and we'll have to work on it. But rule
Speaker 3: of laws fundamental and to your perspective, your point of you, yes,
Speaker 3: my mind, yes, business.
Speaker 6: But I do wonder that you know, soon as you
Speaker 6: look at the November election, that outcome, if it is
Speaker 6: not another Biden White House present, former president from back
Speaker 6: in the White House, what does it mean for the
Speaker 6: tech industry or in terms of the rule.
Speaker 5: Of laws not plowed?
Speaker 4: Well, So, look, I there's the tech industry can pride
Speaker 4: under either administration.
Speaker 3: But I do think that if either buy nor trust stuff.
Speaker 4: But if I think Trump's elected, I think history will
Speaker 4: look back as the beginning of the end of the
Speaker 4: American world order, and that will have a massive effect
Speaker 4: on global business.
Speaker 5: How far are you willing to go? It's a reelect your.
Speaker 4: Well, I'm willing to invest, I'm willing to speak, I'm
Speaker 4: willing to campaign, I'm willing to try to Like when
Speaker 4: a prominent business leader speaks up and says I'm pro drought,
Speaker 4: I call them and I said, let's talk about it.
Speaker 5: Do you ever change their mind?
Speaker 3: Of course?
Speaker 4: Look for example, look, one of the things you have
Speaker 4: to do is think about blind spots, like I just
Speaker 4: said something that was positive about how Trump's administration was running.
Speaker 4: Like I inspite to say you want a new regulation,
Speaker 4: we're move an old one.
Speaker 3: It's an exactly right thing.
Speaker 6: But I think what you said about globally the perception
Speaker 6: of the rest of the world potentially what the US
Speaker 6: means and what it is in terms of busy.
Speaker 4: People will not trust us. They will say we now
Speaker 4: no longer trust that. You're into the world of law
Speaker 4: and equal system all the rest.
Speaker 6: All right, if you weren't in a world where Jenna
Speaker 6: AI was everything twenty seconds, what's the other technology? We
Speaker 6: should have it on radars quickly.
Speaker 4: Well, so the other thing that's following behind it is
Speaker 4: synthetic biology. And when you put them together, by the way,
Speaker 4: like the invention of new pharmaceuticals, new medicines, everything else,
Speaker 4: it's like, let's just hold on to get to the future,
Speaker 4: because the future could be so amazing.
Speaker 6: You do you think about what AI could do right
Speaker 6: and just play around?
Speaker 3: Thank you so much, Thank you for enjuring my pleasure.
Speaker 5: Appreciated read.
Speaker 6: Thank you so much.
Speaker 5: That's Reid Hoffman of PayPal Linked.
Speaker 2: Saying that your Time's best selling author his podcast Possible
Speaker 2: The Possible Podcast.
Speaker 5: Season two started. It's out now,