Speaker 1: There Are No Girls on the Internet, as a production
Speaker 1: of iHeartRadio and Unbossed Creative. I'm Bridget Toad and this
Speaker 1: is There Are No Girls on the Internet. Welcome back
Speaker 1: to There Are No Girls on the Internet. And this
Speaker 1: is another installment of our weekly round up where we
Speaker 1: dig into the stories that you might have missed on the.
Speaker 2: Internet so you don't have to.
Speaker 1: And I am thrilled to introduce to my guest co host,
Speaker 1: Sammy Canter, founder of Girl and the Gub, one of
Speaker 1: my favorite newsletters. Thank you so much for being here, Sammy.
Speaker 3: Oh gosh, thank you so much for having me. I
Speaker 3: am such a fangirl, so apologies in advance because you've
Speaker 3: seen me fainting over here to be on the show Beyond.
Speaker 3: I'm so excited to get into it all. So thank
Speaker 3: you so much.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, I'm very excited to have you on.
Speaker 1: You're one of my favorite Instagram follows. You do something
Speaker 1: that I think is really tough that I aspire to do,
Speaker 1: where you find a good way of blending all of
Speaker 1: the fun of social media with also the politics and
Speaker 1: government stuff that people need to know about. I often
Speaker 1: feel sort of torn between, well, I want my audience
Speaker 1: to know about this, like they should know about this,
Speaker 1: but I don't want to bore them with some like
Speaker 1: government topic, even though it's very important. I feel that
Speaker 1: you have really threaded the needle on social media of
Speaker 1: how you do.
Speaker 3: That, Honored. First of all, we'll be clipping that and
Speaker 3: sending that to anyone I ever pitched for funding in
Speaker 3: the Mirror and distant future all at the same time.
Speaker 3: But yeah, it's an interesting way of looking at politics
Speaker 3: or trying to really essentially get it in front of
Speaker 3: new eyes. And we've learned anything from the last number
Speaker 3: of years is that the old formula isn't working. And
Speaker 3: what I really try and do, whether it's on and
Speaker 3: star TikTok or YouTube shorts for God's sake, is figure
Speaker 3: out a way that it slips into people's day to day.
Speaker 3: They're radars what they're scrolling through anyways. So if that's
Speaker 3: an esthetic outfit video that also happens to have three
Speaker 3: news stories on it in a way that's explained how
Speaker 3: we actually speak, then by all means I'll keep doing it.
Speaker 1: Okay, Well, the first story I want to talk about
Speaker 1: I think kind of fits in your wheelhouse, and that
Speaker 1: is this story about influencer vibe theft.
Speaker 2: So the question is.
Speaker 1: Sort of, can someone sue you for copying your vibe
Speaker 1: or aesthetic on social media?
Speaker 2: Did you hear about this story?
Speaker 3: I did, and so what was interesting is I heard
Speaker 3: just sort of the general overview and the People article,
Speaker 3: and I opened my phone maybe an hour before actually
Speaker 3: we hopped on here, and the influencer that was suing
Speaker 3: was giving her feel about like what actually went down
Speaker 3: and how she felt like the People article and also
Speaker 3: any other sources I covered it were like missing the
Speaker 3: beef of it, the real, you know, the real core
Speaker 3: of what the lawsuit was, which I found so interesting
Speaker 3: and does also shows for that angle, like how sometimes
Speaker 3: things can get lost in the social media sauce aka
Speaker 3: Where's Nuance? Miss? Her Nuance is MII.
Speaker 1: So in her TikTok, she says that this is so
Speaker 1: much more than her trying to copyright a beage aesthetic,
Speaker 1: and that the media is sort of failing to tell
Speaker 1: this story accurately because they're focusing on the most ridiculous
Speaker 1: parts of her suit, the beige esthetic part of it,
Speaker 1: and ignoring the more interesting meatia aspects of it.
Speaker 4: I believe her intention was to look so similar to
Speaker 4: me and copy my post so similarly that she could
Speaker 4: profit off my business. A lot of articles are claiming
Speaker 4: I'm suing over a beige aesthetic. I have never claimed
Speaker 4: to own beige, and I'm not suing anyone over a
Speaker 4: color or a trend. The story the media is telling
Speaker 4: is missing so many details, and the way that they're
Speaker 4: spinning it to make it seem like it's all about
Speaker 4: an aesthetic to create drama is misrepresenting the importance of
Speaker 4: this case.
Speaker 1: So the meat of what's happening here is that it's
Speaker 1: a lawsuit where one influencer is not just saying that
Speaker 1: somebody else is mimicking her aesthetic, which is this beige
Speaker 1: neutral vibe, but going so much for to mimic many
Speaker 1: aspects about her business as an influencer that she argues
Speaker 1: is being done intentionally to create brand confusion and siphon
Speaker 1: from her business as an influencer and content creator. So
Speaker 1: while you might have heard of this lawsuit as oh,
Speaker 1: this influencer thinks she owns the color page, and yeah,
Speaker 1: that part of it might be kind of funny, the
Speaker 1: issue is so much deeper than that. It goes to
Speaker 1: can someone essentially steal the entire look and feel of
Speaker 1: someone else's business, even if that business relies on visual
Speaker 1: aspects or visual aesthetics that may not traditionally be able
Speaker 1: to be copyrighted as somebody else's intellectual property. You know,
Speaker 1: the way that somebody wears their hair or a specific
Speaker 1: tattoo or a specific manicure, or a specific pose and photos.
Speaker 1: So I loved both of these influencers up and it
Speaker 1: is uncanny, like it goes so much further than just
Speaker 1: a beige Look, here's what went down. Influencer Sydney Nicole
Speaker 1: Gifford did a joint photo shoot with twenty twenty three
Speaker 1: with another influencer named Alyssa Shiel.
Speaker 2: After this shoot, Gifford's.
Speaker 1: Claims that she'l started copying her sort of minimal page
Speaker 1: aesthetic and specific poses in her content. But it's not
Speaker 1: just about the specific pose, because when she would do that,
Speaker 1: you know well worn influencer pose where you have the
Speaker 1: phone in front of your face in a mirror, like
Speaker 1: obscuring your face.
Speaker 2: The two are essentially identical, like it is very.
Speaker 1: Difficult to tell one influencer from the other. Like she's
Speaker 1: not wrong, it is uncanny and if you're making money
Speaker 1: from your look as an influencer, and somebody else comes
Speaker 1: in and starts doing that exact same thing to maybe
Speaker 1: create a little bit of brand confusion, I get it.
Speaker 1: Then she'll blocked her on Instagram and TikTok. So Gifford
Speaker 1: sent a season desist, and those season desists were ignored.
Speaker 1: So Gifford filed a first of its kind federal lawsuit
Speaker 1: in twenty twenty four a legend copyright infringement, trade dress misappropriation,
Speaker 1: and unfair competition. So, like you, Sammy, I don't think
Speaker 1: of this as like a frivolous lawsuit. Like I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: this is deeply interesting because as we know, influencers and
Speaker 1: content creators are a big part of the lifeblood of
Speaker 1: like e commerce, and so it's like how brands like
Speaker 1: Amazon become very economically successful. So we're not talking about
Speaker 1: just like, oh, she stole my Look. What she's arguing
Speaker 1: about is like a very suppicific kind of copyright and
Speaker 1: IP dispute. And so it raised the question of can
Speaker 1: somebody sue somebody for allegedly like stealing their their intellectual
Speaker 1: property on social media, which again I just find super interesting.
Speaker 1: According to the fashion law site Gifford's, who commands over
Speaker 1: half a million followers across platforms like Instagram, TikTok, and Amazon.
Speaker 1: Sorefront allegeds that Shield systematically replicated her content and online
Speaker 1: persona to mislead followers and unfairly compete in the influencer
Speaker 1: marketing space central to gifford suit, where her claims that
Speaker 1: she'll copied her copyright protective images, mimics her appearance down
Speaker 1: to specific physical traits such as a flower tattoo, and
Speaker 1: appropriated the distinctive visual and stylistic elements associated with her brand.
Speaker 1: So something I do find interesting about this is I
Speaker 1: just I mean, I'm no attorney, but visually, when I
Speaker 1: look at both women's content, there is definitely a lot
Speaker 1: of aesthetic overlap happening. One of the women just recently
Speaker 1: had a child, and I'm like, oh, well, luckily that
Speaker 1: is one way to make like I was like, okay,
Speaker 1: well that is a distinction because they're so otherwise, they're
Speaker 1: so similar, And it makes me wonder like, in the
Speaker 1: age of Instagram, is can anybody claim to sort of
Speaker 1: be unique or distinct when so much of what gets
Speaker 1: popular on Instagram because of algorithms is things that seem
Speaker 1: like copies of each other, right, Like all of the
Speaker 1: influencers use this specific pose. They're all they have a
Speaker 1: specific manicure, a specific look. If both of these women
Speaker 1: are sort of chilling for Amazon's Amazon clothing, like, it's
Speaker 1: not surprising that they might have some overlap.
Speaker 2: But the case actually was.
Speaker 1: Essentially dropped with the influencer, the one accused of doing
Speaker 1: the copying having to pay nothing. Is what seems like
Speaker 1: that case might have answered that question of like, can
Speaker 1: you copyright an aesthetic? I'm not an attorney, but it
Speaker 1: seems like from this lawsuit answer is perhaps no.
Speaker 3: Yeah. I think it's super interesting. And what the girl
Speaker 3: that was suing said in her TikTok was that she
Speaker 3: had to drop the case because it was getting incredibly expensive.
Speaker 3: So had she had the funds, like, there may have
Speaker 3: been a continued pursuit at least on some some frame here,
Speaker 3: which I find interesting in and of itself. And I
Speaker 3: do think that in the creator sphere too, money gets
Speaker 3: in the way, Right we think about how many people
Speaker 3: would actually sue if they had the money to do
Speaker 3: so in terms of somebody copying them. We see it
Speaker 3: with small brands all the time with big brands we have.
Speaker 3: I don't know if you saw this, but there is
Speaker 3: in the city this vintage brand called Kissing Cowboys and
Speaker 3: it's run by also like an influencer, one of those
Speaker 3: people that's just like at the cross section of many things.
Speaker 3: And Brandy Melville allegedly copied her logo, which she went
Speaker 3: on to say that is not just like a Canva
Speaker 3: logo or something like that. Her and her sister handmade
Speaker 3: the logo and the brand has copy and pasted the
Speaker 3: exact logo onto a T shirt that they have god
Speaker 3: knows how many skews of that they're selling in their stores.
Speaker 3: And so you have a small creator that has a
Speaker 3: small brand that doesn't have the funds most likely to
Speaker 3: soon pursue this. So I think like that also is
Speaker 3: particularly interesting to me because if creators had more monetary means,
Speaker 3: and same with small brands, where would that really lie,
Speaker 3: Like what would the decision process actually look like? For
Speaker 3: that It just leaves me with more questions. But I
Speaker 3: do think in this particular case, the thing that gave
Speaker 3: me the ooh, that's a little creepy and maybe it's
Speaker 3: almost like a different angle is seeing the matching tattoos,
Speaker 3: the blocking almost the intentionality of it, because you also
Speaker 3: go into that other frame, right, Like, if you are
Speaker 3: an influencer, you expect people to copy you, right, That's
Speaker 3: part of the job is to push people to do
Speaker 3: things that you're doing, or to lead them to an
Speaker 3: idea to consider it. So where does that start and
Speaker 3: where does that end? I think there definitely is some
Speaker 3: gray area when the person is starting to get exactly
Speaker 3: the same as body or and copying things at the
Speaker 3: same timetable. Yes, uh, that's where I'm like, ooh.
Speaker 1: She alleges that she got she has a very distinctive
Speaker 1: flower tattoo on her arm, and she says that this
Speaker 1: influencer who was copying her got the same distinctive tattoo. Like,
Speaker 1: first of all, that is commitment to the bit, that is,
Speaker 1: you were really committing to copying this woman. But it
Speaker 1: is uncanny and the fact that they're both specifically Amazon influencers,
Speaker 1: they both do that Amazon storefront you know, hashtag Amazon finds.
Speaker 1: She basically is arguing that she is intentionally trying to
Speaker 1: confuse that what would be their audience market into like
Speaker 1: associating the two, which I think is that's like a
Speaker 1: very good point. So, reflecting on this, professor of law
Speaker 1: and Media Faculey director of the Center for Law, Information
Speaker 1: and Creativity Alexander Roberts wrote, surprising or not deeming any
Speaker 1: of the Gifford's claims plausible for creators posting similar content
Speaker 1: has serious implications thanks to the fact that influencer marketing
Speaker 1: has become increasingly central to commerce and social media. Content
Speaker 1: more broadly is built on trends and served to users
Speaker 1: via algorithms, which are quick to push content related to
Speaker 1: what users click and or linger on in their feeds.
Speaker 1: Roberts asserts that intellectual property law has not traditionally protected
Speaker 1: the way somebody styles their hair, makes up their face,
Speaker 1: or decorates their home, whether or not those choices are
Speaker 1: photographed and shared. And I do think it's sort of
Speaker 1: I mean, had this case had had the influencer who
Speaker 1: was making these these allegations been able to have the
Speaker 1: funds to see this case through, it could have been
Speaker 1: very different. But had it been, you know, had it
Speaker 1: gone differently, this could have potentially like set an entire
Speaker 1: new precedent when it comes to IP online, which I
Speaker 1: just find fascinating.
Speaker 3: Totally, which I do think could be troubling for the
Speaker 3: larger creator industry because sometimes you don't understand that, like
Speaker 3: you used x y Z sound and it came from
Speaker 3: this person and they created a trend off of it,
Speaker 3: Like where's the origins? It's really hard to trace that
Speaker 3: origin of a trend, you know, a concept or whatnot.
Speaker 3: So struggle.
Speaker 5: Let's take a quick break at our back.
Speaker 1: Okay, so I have to talk about this story with
Speaker 1: Real Page really quickly. I will say right off the top,
Speaker 1: it doesn't really fit with the content that we usually do.
Speaker 1: But Real Page is my personal like I think of
Speaker 1: them as my personal enemy. So any time that I
Speaker 1: got an opportunity to talk shit about that, I will
Speaker 1: take it.
Speaker 2: So indulge me.
Speaker 1: So on the episode last week, we were talking about
Speaker 1: this provision buried in Donald Trump's big, beautiful budget bill
Speaker 1: that would ban states from enforcing laws on AI for
Speaker 1: ten years.
Speaker 2: Did you hear about this?
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, yeah, States Rights? Oh yeah, miss exactly again,
Speaker 3: Like okay, exactly.
Speaker 5: So.
Speaker 1: One of the kind of real world examples of how
Speaker 1: this might impact people that I talked about when we
Speaker 1: talked about that bill was how scumbag landlords are able
Speaker 1: to use technology like real Page that allow landlords in
Speaker 1: a whole area to work together, to coordinate to essentially
Speaker 1: algorithmically determine how much they can raise your rents. Right,
Speaker 1: So the government has called this price fixing, which I
Speaker 1: happen to agree. So these are scumbags who make scumbag
Speaker 1: technology for scumbag landlords, and as a lifelong renter, these
Speaker 1: people are my biggest ops. Like, I cannot stand this.
Speaker 1: I think this technology is ruining cities. I hate it.
Speaker 1: Twenty two, a report from Republica linked real Page to
Speaker 1: rising rent prices across the United States, alleging that its
Speaker 1: algorithm allows landlords to coordinate pricing, and the Department of
Speaker 1: Justice in eight states sued real Page last year, claiming
Speaker 1: that it deprives renters like me of the benefits of
Speaker 1: competition on apartment leasing terms. So, cities like Minneapolis, Jersey Cities,
Speaker 1: and Francisco, Philadelphia and others have passed laws that are
Speaker 1: meant to ban the use of this kind of algorithmic
Speaker 1: AI based rent setting software, and other states have legislation
Speaker 1: like this in the works. But if this budget bill passes,
Speaker 1: that means that states can no longer enforce those kinds
Speaker 1: of laws, which would be a reals win for scumbag
Speaker 1: landlords and the company that makes this rent raising technology,
Speaker 1: Real Page. So now senators are basically asking did Real
Speaker 1: Page pay to get that provision buried in the budget bill?
Speaker 2: This week?
Speaker 1: Lawmakers say that they believe Real Page might have spent
Speaker 1: millions of dollars pushing for this provision. In a letter
Speaker 1: that they sent to Real Page a CEO, five Democratic
Speaker 1: Senators Warren, Sanders, klobashar Booker, and Smith are asking for
Speaker 1: more information about Real Page's potential involvement. The letter reads,
Speaker 1: in light of this, we seek information on Real Page's
Speaker 1: lobbying efforts and how the Republican's reconciliation provision would help
Speaker 1: the bottom line of Real Page and other large corporations,
Speaker 1: allowing them to take advantage of consumers. So I just
Speaker 1: have to shout that out. First of all, just the
Speaker 1: feeling of reading senators doing something that I feel like
Speaker 1: does have a real impact on the lives of constituents,
Speaker 1: Like it's just nice to be like, oh yeah, governing,
Speaker 1: like somebody's out there doing it for sure.
Speaker 3: No, literally, especially in these chaotic times. It sort of
Speaker 3: like is anyone doing anything, I think is often how
Speaker 3: people feel. Sometimes there's the feeling versus the reality. You know,
Speaker 3: did somebody actually go and go to gov track and
Speaker 3: see what bills were introduced? Right? There's always sort of
Speaker 3: like that extra of things. But I think, for me,
Speaker 3: when I think about this, to see that they're actually
Speaker 3: looking at a tech piece of something, right, Like I
Speaker 3: think that we understandably look at Congress at large and go,
Speaker 3: oh my gosh, these old dudes that have no idea
Speaker 3: how to even open Instagram unless like some assistant helps them.
Speaker 3: You know, how could they ever understand AI and its
Speaker 3: possible implications and everything else under that soun? So I
Speaker 3: think to even see that they're reacting, I mean, I'm
Speaker 3: not surprised that Elizabeth Warren was reacting given sort of
Speaker 3: her expertise, but elsephies and I hope that it continues
Speaker 3: to expand because AI it honestly, it freaks me the
Speaker 3: fuck out, Like I really, really like, am not a fan.
Speaker 3: I know it's integrated into so many things that we do,
Speaker 3: even the things that we don't even realize, but I
Speaker 3: just don't like it. I don't think it's a thing
Speaker 3: for good. Oftentimes, I really think, especially given the hands
Speaker 3: that it's coming out of, that it's a thing for
Speaker 3: bad and that if we are one habit, that it
Speaker 3: needs bar rails, and the fact that this bill would
Speaker 3: get rid of those guardrails right and make it. I mean,
Speaker 3: if thinking about like how much AI has come into
Speaker 3: our lives, like literally the last year and a half,
Speaker 3: how much it's taken over the conversation. I mean, a
Speaker 3: year and a half ago, I wouldn't even imagine that
Speaker 3: we were talking about AI as much as we are.
Speaker 3: So think about what that looks like on an accelerated
Speaker 3: page for ten years, right?
Speaker 1: And I mean I think it comes down to, like,
Speaker 1: do people want a world where the not just the
Speaker 1: rent in your building, but the rent in your entire
Speaker 1: city goes up so the ceo of real pages scumbag
Speaker 1: ahi price fixing tool can make more money?
Speaker 2: Is that a better world for you? Probably? You and me?
Speaker 2: Probably not.
Speaker 1: Definitely a better world for the CEO of this technology
Speaker 1: company who is making money from it and profiting from it.
Speaker 2: But yeah, I would just argue like I ken't.
Speaker 1: I mean, I could talk all day the fact that
Speaker 1: this provision would so clearly benefit fit the owners of
Speaker 1: this tech company and harm just regular people trying to
Speaker 1: make rent. You and me renters like people who you know,
Speaker 1: just regular folks. I think is pretty clear, and so yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm with you. I think when you think.
Speaker 2: About the values of.
Speaker 1: The people who make technology like this, I tend to
Speaker 1: think it's not going to be technology that makes our
Speaker 1: lives better. I think it's really poised to exploit.
Speaker 3: And certainly this budget bill is not the way to
Speaker 3: solve any of those potential problems. We look at this
Speaker 3: budget bill too, and how it's going to increase the
Speaker 3: deficit astronomically over the next ten years. So you pair
Speaker 3: that with crashing essentially in a long way the economy
Speaker 3: by knocking out the biggest you know, entry level segment
Speaker 3: for white collar jobs. What like, what are we doing?
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's it's not good.
Speaker 1: And I have to say, like another story that I
Speaker 1: was reading this week that kind of speaks to the
Speaker 1: way that advancements of technology like AI really are hurting
Speaker 1: us and particularly the most marginalized among us. This story
Speaker 1: that this came out from Full for Media, Like shout
Speaker 1: out to them for being on this. We use their
Speaker 1: reporting on the show all the time because they are
Speaker 1: experts over there. So the vast network of surveillance that
Speaker 1: we have in this country, like license plate reader surveillance tools,
Speaker 1: well all of that is being used to track people
Speaker 1: who are suspected of getting abortions. This is not shocking,
Speaker 1: like It's what abortion advocates and like tech privacy advocates
Speaker 1: have been warning is going to happen, and it's happening.
Speaker 1: So four h four Media found that authorities in Texas
Speaker 1: performed a nationwide search of over eighty three thousand automatic
Speaker 1: license plate reader cameras while looking for a woman that
Speaker 1: they said had self administered an abortion, including looking at
Speaker 1: cameras in states where abortion is legal, such as Illinois
Speaker 1: and Washington. So this technology, this license plate reader camera
Speaker 1: technology is made by a company called Flock, and it
Speaker 1: is usually marketed as being able to track and stop
Speaker 1: carjackings or like fine missing people, but it can also
Speaker 1: be used to surveil people suspected of getting abortion care
Speaker 1: across state lines. So the Texas sheriff in this case says, oh,
Speaker 1: we were not trying to surveil her for having gotten
Speaker 1: an abortion. On May night, an officer from the Johnson
Speaker 1: County Sheriff's Office in Texas searched flop cameras and gave
Speaker 1: the reason for why he was searching these cameras as.
Speaker 1: Quote had an abortion search for female according to multiple
Speaker 1: sets of data. So whenever officers are searching flop cameras,
Speaker 1: they're required to provide a reason for doing so, and
Speaker 1: so they don't need a court order or a warrant.
Speaker 1: But like, that was the reason that he stated that
Speaker 1: female had an abortion. So he claims that the only
Speaker 1: reason he did this is because, oh, the woman's family
Speaker 1: had contacted us and that they were worried. He says,
Speaker 1: her family was worried that she was going to bleed
Speaker 1: to death, and we were trying to find her to
Speaker 1: get her to a hospital. We weren't trying to block
Speaker 1: her from leaving the state or whatever to get an abortion.
Speaker 1: It was absolutely about her safety. So I got my
Speaker 1: start an abortion advocacy. So it's something I know a
Speaker 1: bit about. I have a lot of questions about this
Speaker 1: because when you're talking about like a self managed abortion,
Speaker 1: typically you're talking about a pill based abortion, which is
Speaker 1: incredibly safe. While some bleeding is common, the risk of
Speaker 1: complications and death is very very low, And so I'm
Speaker 1: curious why they would think that this woman was at
Speaker 1: risk of bleeding to death from having what I assume
Speaker 1: is a pill based abortion. And even if they were
Speaker 1: worried about her safety, that doesn't mean you can't be
Speaker 1: criminalized for it. For for Media spoke to Elizabeth Ling,
Speaker 1: a senior counsel for IF When How, a reproductive rights
Speaker 1: group that runs a reproductive legal rights hotline, who pointed
Speaker 1: out that many of the criminal cases that they have
Speaker 1: seen of people being criminalized for trying to get an
Speaker 1: abortion originate after somebody close to that person reports it.
Speaker 2: To the police.
Speaker 1: They say that a research report published by the groups
Speaker 1: found that about a quarter of adult cases were reported
Speaker 1: to law enforcement by acquaintances entrusted with information like friends, parents,
Speaker 1: or intimate partners. So even if they were like, oh,
Speaker 1: we were just worried about her, that is not a
Speaker 1: situation that would protect her from being criminalized, especially in
Speaker 1: a state like Texas, where abortion is essentially most in
Speaker 1: most cases criminalized already.
Speaker 3: A thousand recent and I just I also just question
Speaker 3: the way it's presented right that the family's first reaction
Speaker 3: would be to call the cops, right help. I can't
Speaker 3: think of a situation where if I thought somebody was
Speaker 3: in need of medical care, that my first call would
Speaker 3: be to the cops.
Speaker 1: Right when I when I know that I am in Texas,
Speaker 1: a place where that call could potentially wind with her
Speaker 1: behind bars.
Speaker 3: Totally also like to give like a slight benefit of
Speaker 3: the doubt. I do think that there are so many
Speaker 3: people in this country, in every state, that have no
Speaker 3: idea what's going on with abortion laws. This has not
Speaker 3: crossed their desk, Like I know, it seems like one
Speaker 3: of those things like how could it not have? But
Speaker 3: I as we've seen with also other cases too, people
Speaker 3: are really really unaware until oftentimes they are in a
Speaker 3: situation either miscarrying, trying to get their own care, whatever
Speaker 3: it may be, that they are realizing, oh shoot, like
Speaker 3: this is not what I realized our reality was. So like, yes,
Speaker 3: I could understand a family not understanding that they are
Speaker 3: actually putting their family member in legal jeopardy, But I
Speaker 3: still just find that being their first call a little strange.
Speaker 3: Not like the EMTs, you know, or not going after
Speaker 3: trying to find your relative yourself. It just seems strange.
Speaker 3: It's not the behavior that I would think most people
Speaker 3: would have. Perhaps I'm in the minority on that, But
Speaker 3: I just find it odd and I find it worrying too,
Speaker 3: that this is what we're using this tech for, which
Speaker 3: is again all the worries are back. It's like, if
Speaker 3: we're going to have certain technology available, we need to
Speaker 3: be very specific on how we're using that, and there
Speaker 3: needs to be guidelines, laws, regulations on how that is
Speaker 3: actually able to be used.
Speaker 1: The organization Privacy International actually just came out with a
Speaker 1: new report looking at how much very sensitive data that
Speaker 1: apps like period trackers are collecting and sharing and how
Speaker 1: that data can be potentially dangerous in a landscape where
Speaker 1: abortion is increasingly criminalized. So the news is kind of
Speaker 1: mixed and that their report showed that apps have gotten
Speaker 1: better with their privacy policies, but the landscape has actually
Speaker 1: gotten worse, and so the bar needs to be higher
Speaker 1: when it comes to privacy. To your point about this
Speaker 1: is what we're using this technology for, I think that
Speaker 1: technology and AI makes things that were not uncommon in
Speaker 1: the abortion fight just much easier to scale. Like back
Speaker 1: in the day, you know, I was doing abortion advocacy
Speaker 1: work for a really long time. Back in the day,
Speaker 1: it used to be that anti abortion advocates would like
Speaker 1: stand in parking lots and manually write down the license
Speaker 1: place of people who drove into clinics.
Speaker 2: And then they were incredibly well coordinated.
Speaker 1: And I can tell you from like personal experience that
Speaker 1: they essentially it felt like the police were on their side, right,
Speaker 1: and so like that was just from my experience, So
Speaker 1: like they they would. They were these people who were
Speaker 1: like incredibly dedicated to busying themselves of the business of others,
Speaker 1: and it took a lot of work and coordination and
Speaker 1: like in real life, you know, coming out to stand
Speaker 1: outside of clinics and things like that. But now companies
Speaker 1: like blog are selling the ability to do that at scale,
Speaker 1: maybe without even having to like leave your home with
Speaker 1: this technology. And it's an incredibly terrifying harbingerk of how
Speaker 1: technology will be used to like further surveil and criminalize
Speaker 1: both the people who need abortions and the people who
Speaker 1: help them, like people who you know in Texas, I
Speaker 1: believe it's even criminalized to like support or help somebody
Speaker 1: who was looking for an abortion, right And so it's
Speaker 1: just a really scary vision of where we might be
Speaker 1: heading when it comes to the use of this technology
Speaker 1: to further criminalize people from getting abortions.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I don't think we're headed in a great spot,
Speaker 3: and I will be curious to see if any Blue
Speaker 3: states react legislatively on anything like this. I haven't seen
Speaker 3: anything cross my desk so far, but I would be
Speaker 3: curious to see if anything in terms of data sharing,
Speaker 3: uh sort of pops up in the next few months
Speaker 3: for anyone that's continuing to be in session, or also.
Speaker 2: Next year me too.
Speaker 1: More after a quick break, let's get right back into it.
Speaker 1: So I want to switch gears a little bit. So
Speaker 1: I am I am not. I don't use dating apps.
Speaker 1: I'm not on the market. However, I'm so fascinated by that.
Speaker 1: But when they make changes to like entice users like,
Speaker 1: I'm always, like very curious what those changes are. While
Speaker 1: Tinder is testing letting users set a hype preference. So
Speaker 1: Tinder is testing out this feature that let's paid subscribers
Speaker 1: add hype preferences to their profile.
Speaker 2: So it will not be a hard filter.
Speaker 1: Rather, the setting will indicate a preference, and that means
Speaker 1: it won't actually block or exclude profiles with that hype preference,
Speaker 1: but that hype preference, if they add it will inform
Speaker 1: what kind of recommendations you see when swiping. So this
Speaker 1: is one of the ways that we already know that
Speaker 1: dating apps inform people's preferences. As tech Crunch puts it,
Speaker 1: it is not uncommon to come across profiles where women
Speaker 1: state they're only looking for matches who are at least
Speaker 1: six feet tall, for instance, even if in real life
Speaker 1: they would be more flexible about this requirement. So I
Speaker 1: will say we've talked a bit about this on the
Speaker 1: podcast before. It's not just about height. Like we did
Speaker 1: an episode with sociologist and author of the book Not
Speaker 1: My Type, Automating Sexual Racism and Online Dating, doctor apral Williams,
Speaker 1: and she has an entire body of research about this when.
Speaker 2: It comes to race.
Speaker 1: She found in her research that dating apps oftentimes are
Speaker 1: not just like reflecting our biases, but they're actually reinforcing
Speaker 1: our biases. And it makes me wonder if dating apps
Speaker 1: are also doing this thing, the same thing with height.
Speaker 2: And I actually did wanna.
Speaker 1: I don't want to put anybody on the spot here,
Speaker 1: but I think we have a short I mean you you,
Speaker 1: I don't want to put words in your mouth. How
Speaker 1: how do you, Mike producer Mike how do you identify
Speaker 1: how do you identify?
Speaker 6: No, No, I'm a shorter guy. I'm a shorter guy.
Speaker 6: I am five six and change. I will own that.
Speaker 6: It's it's who I am. And you know, a few
Speaker 6: years ago, I was on the dating apps, and yeah,
Speaker 6: there were a lot of women who had put in
Speaker 6: their profiles, you know, only men six feet are above
Speaker 6: or whatever their arbitrary threshold was. And that's fine, Like
Speaker 6: I do, I have zero interest in dating a woman
Speaker 6: who would put that in her dating profile. I wish
Speaker 6: her luck. I think there's a lot of women out
Speaker 6: there who probably would prefer a taller guy, but maybe
Speaker 6: they're open to a shorter guy. Great, that's you know,
Speaker 6: a more appropriate woman for me. Uh so that's fine.
Speaker 2: I I don't know.
Speaker 6: I feel it's like there's already a bit of an
Speaker 6: auto filter. I would put my height in my profile
Speaker 6: just to like skip that whole song and dance. So
Speaker 6: I don't know that this is going to be like
Speaker 6: the magic bullet that saves Tinder, but uh, you know,
Speaker 6: let him try.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I don't think so. Because also for hinge, you
Speaker 3: automatically have your height on there, right, so you can
Speaker 3: pay it to filter that I believe, I mean, you're
Speaker 3: not going to find me paying for a dating app
Speaker 3: like that is ridiculous in my opinion, Sorry, just like
Speaker 3: like I can't but it is already a thing, So
Speaker 3: I don't know how they're so late that's feature, Like
Speaker 3: I just I feel like it's like we're going back
Speaker 3: to I don't know, twenty fifteen, Like where have you
Speaker 3: been in terms of tender.
Speaker 1: So this is what I think too, And this is
Speaker 1: what I found like almost a little offensive about the story.
Speaker 1: In the tech Crunch piece on this, they say the
Speaker 1: company may hope if the addition of a height setting
Speaker 1: could encourage more women to use and pay for the app,
Speaker 1: which tends to be heavily dominated by men in both
Speaker 1: the US and internationally. So this, to me, I think,
Speaker 1: really says it all. Like it seems to suggest that
Speaker 1: women like, what women really want is the ability to
Speaker 1: read people out by height, and that's what women are
Speaker 1: willing to pay for, when in reality, I think the
Speaker 1: reason why dating apps are in trouble and that like
Speaker 1: women don't want to use them is because they're not
Speaker 1: serving up women or really anybody good experiences.
Speaker 2: And they're not.
Speaker 1: Serving up good experiences for anybody men either, And so
Speaker 1: the people designing these apps, like if that's what they
Speaker 1: think will meaningfully woo women into paying for Tinder Premium.
Speaker 1: I think that perhaps that gives us insight into like
Speaker 1: why women are not paying for Tinder Premium or using
Speaker 1: these apps at all, because I just don't think that
Speaker 1: they really are functionally understanding what it is that women want,
Speaker 1: or like how to give women dating experiences that.
Speaker 2: Don't feel so bad.
Speaker 1: Also, I have to say, Mike, when we were talking
Speaker 1: about this before we got on the mic, you were like, oh, well,
Speaker 1: we have data that suggests that men are just lying
Speaker 1: about their heights on dating profiles, right, like, it wouldn't
Speaker 1: even work.
Speaker 6: It's true, you're both women. So I'm curious if you've
Speaker 6: ever experienced this phenomenon of a man lying.
Speaker 3: First of all, right, like just cutt and clips. But
Speaker 3: second to that, I mean, you know, like when you
Speaker 3: go on Pinge, for example, and the guy says five
Speaker 3: to ten that he's five eight, you have to subtract
Speaker 3: two inches from any any height.
Speaker 1: Sammy, it is so funny that you say this because
Speaker 1: according to Okcupan, who published this data, they say that
Speaker 1: that is exactly the amount that men are adding, so
Speaker 1: they're they're suspiciously adding two inches taller to their right.
Speaker 1: So the man says five eight, you got to take
Speaker 1: two off of that because that's the lie. And what
Speaker 1: I feel like is like, okay, one inch, I'll give
Speaker 1: you that two.
Speaker 2: So that's a little much.
Speaker 3: They think that they can get away with it if
Speaker 3: they're wearing a hat. They're like, oh, let's see, it's
Speaker 3: like that hat, like I sto's the extra extra.
Speaker 1: The show's a platform boot at a stow top hat?
Speaker 2: Is what is the Abraham Lincoln hats? Yeah, like like
Speaker 2: a top hat.
Speaker 6: Yeah, and then he just has to wear that for
Speaker 6: the rest of the relationship, like he wears it to bed,
Speaker 6: he wears it to work.
Speaker 3: Honestly, at least he'd have a sense of humor. You'd
Speaker 3: be like, wow, bringing something into the table Live Vestinel.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: As a tall woman, so I'm five eleven and a
Speaker 1: half in any kind of shoe, I'm six feet.
Speaker 2: When I the short period that I was on.
Speaker 1: Dating apps, I did put my height in my profile
Speaker 1: because I mean, I I mean maybe I'm I feel
Speaker 1: like that sort of you know, height wars stuff is
Speaker 1: like a little overblown and I never found anybody who
Speaker 1: had an issue with my height, but Mike, similar to you,
Speaker 1: I didn't want to be on a date with somebody
Speaker 1: who would like not want to be with someone who
Speaker 1: was six feet tall. But again, I do think it
Speaker 1: like it just suggests to me that dating the people
Speaker 1: who make dating apps are just not really thinking too
Speaker 1: hard or thoughtfully about the kinds of experience as they're
Speaker 1: trying to curate for people. And I think that that
Speaker 1: is the root of the problem as to why they're
Speaker 1: in trouble, these little gimmicks about height or whatever.
Speaker 2: Not only Samy, as.
Speaker 1: You said, are they like out of Night out of
Speaker 1: twenty fifteen or something.
Speaker 2: They're very late.
Speaker 1: But I just don't think there what is going to
Speaker 1: save these platforms. I think they need to really be
Speaker 1: thinking about, like how to improve experiences in a more
Speaker 1: meaningful way totally.
Speaker 3: And I think there's this idea out there. I don't
Speaker 3: know if this is technologically accurate or not, but people
Speaker 3: feel like they're being served matches that aren't accurate to
Speaker 3: them or just absolutely trash. So and then if they
Speaker 3: pay for the better, you know, the upgraded premium version
Speaker 3: whatever it's called that, then they're going to be provided
Speaker 3: better matches, and so that paywall to better matches is
Speaker 3: also making people being like this isn't worth it, because
Speaker 3: then if you do pay it isn't necessarily better and
Speaker 3: it's a whole nother like level of gatekeeping, Like no
Speaker 3: one's getting anything more necessarily from it. We're just creating
Speaker 3: more barriers when I think people in the dating sphere
Speaker 3: already feel like there's tons of barriers to meeting anyone.
Speaker 3: So I think there's that element. And I also think
Speaker 3: even too, I mean, like to your point about these
Speaker 3: people that are making these ups, like maybe they should
Speaker 3: look at the prompts available. Some of them are like
Speaker 3: if you were doing orientation freshman year at college and
Speaker 3: you're all looking around the room like this cannot be.
Speaker 3: This is so cringe. That's what these things are. So
Speaker 3: I just I think are used. The people in charge
Speaker 3: of the tech are not asking the right questions, and
Speaker 3: they don't know their audience. They think they know their audience,
Speaker 3: they think that a subset of data has told them, oh,
Speaker 3: this is who our audience is, but they clearly haven't
Speaker 3: spoken with those people because I think and that seems
Speaker 3: to be a missing link across the whole space, whether
Speaker 3: it's tech, whether it's the consumer space, whether it's politics.
Speaker 3: I feel as though people just aren't having conversations with
Speaker 3: their actual target market. Yeah, because if they did, the
Speaker 3: feedback would be so much different, because I'm having those
Speaker 3: conversations and I could give you like fifteen different points
Speaker 3: that are so different from what they are sharing in
Speaker 3: their big reports.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I think you really nailed it.
Speaker 1: Like, we are so much more complex than like a
Speaker 1: set of data that a tech company has on us,
Speaker 1: and I think that they are trying to make decisions
Speaker 1: about platform experiences based on narrowing us down into a
Speaker 1: very specific set of data that they have on us.
Speaker 2: I think that's exactly right totally.
Speaker 3: Because like, even think about someone's past, like dating experience,
Speaker 3: that wouldn't be a part of that data necessarily. Say
Speaker 3: they had their they were dating their high school sweetheart
Speaker 3: for ten years and they were a short king and
Speaker 3: then they had a terrible breakup, right, and then this
Speaker 3: is their first entree onto the dating apps, and so
Speaker 3: they don't want to do anything with any short kings.
Speaker 3: They're over it. So therefore it's going to inform their
Speaker 3: hype preferences, which obviously the dating app wouldn't know because
Speaker 3: this is their first time on the app and swiping,
Speaker 3: and they're only going to think of it as, oh,
Speaker 3: this person's a snob about twelve versus short not understanding
Speaker 3: their past personal interpersonal relationships. Right, So, like there's so
Speaker 3: many of those things that aren't captured that again, we're
Speaker 3: just they're just missing it. They're just missing it.
Speaker 2: They're just missing it. That's a good way to put it.
Speaker 1: Okay, So I have to ask you about this Nancy
Speaker 1: Mace report from Wired.
Speaker 2: It is a lot, I mean.
Speaker 1: South Carolina Republican Representative Nancy Mace is a lot herself.
Speaker 1: Like there's all I mean, she's just there's a lot
Speaker 1: going on with her. So, according to Wired, who spoke
Speaker 1: to a bunch of her former staffers, Nancy Mays would
Speaker 1: frequently monitor her image on social media, even going so
Speaker 1: far as to create bots to comment across social media
Speaker 1: in support of her and in this attempt to boost
Speaker 1: her image, and she allegedly also asked her staff to
Speaker 1: create fake profiles on social media in order to keep
Speaker 1: an eye on the discourse about her and generally boost
Speaker 1: her image online. According to one of her former staffers.
Speaker 1: They told Wired we had to make multiple accounts, burner accounts,
Speaker 1: and go and reply to comments saying things that were
Speaker 1: not true, even on Reddit forums. We were congressional staff
Speaker 1: and there were actual things we could have been doing
Speaker 1: to help our constituents. I would say that it was
Speaker 1: at least a weekly comment, if not daily. People Magazine
Speaker 1: called her staff or her aufice today for comment, and
Speaker 1: they kind of like made a little joke. They were like, oh, well,
Speaker 1: apparently we're too busy creating cop bots and making comments
Speaker 1: to answer your query.
Speaker 2: But this is just my opinion.
Speaker 1: I absolutely can see her doing this, Like, I absolutely
Speaker 1: see it. I have no trouble believing this about her, none.
Speaker 3: Oh none. And also her past staff clearly hates her,
Speaker 3: oh my god, yeah, in an inch of her life,
Speaker 3: like absolutely hates her guts because obviously it's the hell
Speaker 3: of the story. But it doesn't it just doesn't help anyone.
Speaker 3: So you really have to be quite bitter to get
Speaker 3: yourself in a mess like this talking about your old boss.
Speaker 3: So the first thing that pops up. Second to that,
Speaker 3: I really doubt that she is the only member of
Speaker 3: Congress doing this, Like I don't know anyone personally doing this.
Speaker 3: Let me just go on record saying okay, it's and
Speaker 3: also second to that, I do wonder if it comes
Speaker 3: into violation of campaign financeauce.
Speaker 2: That's a really good question, very good question.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I bet she's not the only person doing this.
Speaker 1: But something tells me like, like, if you're gonna do
Speaker 1: this and get your staff mixed up to them, you
Speaker 1: better be treating that staff pretty good. And the fact
Speaker 1: that your staff is this leaky and that they're like
Speaker 1: running to wired to be like she makes us do this.
Speaker 2: I think you're right. It really says something about the
Speaker 2: dynamic on her staff.
Speaker 1: And the report actually quoted a deposition from Wesley Donahue,
Speaker 1: a South Carolina based campaign consultant who previously worked closely
Speaker 1: with Mace's campaigns. Donna Hue told a court quote, she
Speaker 1: programs her own bots, sets up Twitter burner accounts. This
Speaker 1: is the kind of thing she does. She sits all
Speaker 1: night on the couch and programs bots because she's very,
Speaker 1: very computer savvy. She controls her own voter database, she
Speaker 1: programs a lot of her own website. She programs Facebook
Speaker 1: bots and Instagram bots and Twitter bots. It's what she
Speaker 1: does for fun. And let me tell you what a
Speaker 1: like grim projection of what an evening at Nancy Mace's
Speaker 1: house must look like. A courage us on the couch
Speaker 1: having a great time controlling her bot army like pretty grim.
Speaker 3: No, for sure, I mean, holy narcissism.
Speaker 1: And it's so wild to think that when Nancy Mays
Speaker 1: first came on the scene many many many years ago,
Speaker 1: was because she was the first woman trying to get
Speaker 1: into the citadel, like she has had a very long
Speaker 1: kind of life in public, and yeah, it just seems
Speaker 1: like something's going on. And subsequently I have no trouble
Speaker 1: believing this report from why I guess I'll just put it.
Speaker 3: That way totally and again I would a thousand percent
Speaker 3: guarantee she's not the only one doing it, maybe at
Speaker 3: the obsessive capacity in which she is clearly doing it
Speaker 3: aka the night at Nancy Macey's right.
Speaker 5: But.
Speaker 3: I mean, if you spend as we both do, you know,
Speaker 3: being chronically online people, you start to understand what is
Speaker 3: at what isn't a bot, what their sort of characteristics are,
Speaker 3: and how they pop up occasionally. I bully want to
Speaker 3: be honest, a nice little bott and bully just to
Speaker 3: see them prove themselves as a bot can be a
Speaker 3: little fun asking them insane questions and sort of seeing
Speaker 3: what they spin out. It is satisfying. But I think
Speaker 3: just seeing sort of you know, knowing that that is
Speaker 3: the way of the world. That there's so many bots,
Speaker 3: I mean, there are also so many people paying for
Speaker 3: these bots and creating them on both sides of the aisle,
Speaker 3: so and beyond that, beyond our borders. So yeah, we're
Speaker 3: in a war of clips and we're in a war
Speaker 3: of bots. But I think the more that people know
Speaker 3: the media landscape like that is the reality that we
Speaker 3: are in to be aware when you go to a
Speaker 3: comment section that what you are seeing might not be reality,
Speaker 3: Right that comment on TikTok that has fifty thousand likes
Speaker 3: from user one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, like that,
Speaker 3: that particular comment is trying to curate a reaction, and
Speaker 3: supposed to it's also being utilized to curate more, you know,
Speaker 3: not just reactions in terms of the likes to it,
Speaker 3: but the comments and then the videos off of can
Speaker 3: you believe this comment section? So I think at least
Speaker 3: if we're in a position where people understand what they're
Speaker 3: actually in taking and what risks there are to seeing
Speaker 3: a comment section. I think we're at least a little
Speaker 3: bit better at a spot. But hey, that's another area
Speaker 3: where I say, hey, where's the regulation on this bot situation?
Speaker 3: Because it's crazy and people really believe what they read
Speaker 3: no matter what, so and even it doesn't matter how
Speaker 3: smart the person is, Like, I think we're all guilty
Speaker 3: of it too, being like, wait, oh my god, all
Speaker 3: the vibe chuck on this comment section. People are really
Speaker 3: feeling xyz way and right. It's just how you feel
Speaker 3: about something. And we as people, I think, oftentimes want
Speaker 3: to see the best in what we're taking in and
Speaker 3: the best of intentions, but oftentimes that's not the case.
Speaker 1: So Sammy, you are somebody who has a ton of
Speaker 1: experience with this. This is very much in your wheelhouse.
Speaker 1: You've had ten years in media, pr, comms, politics, and
Speaker 1: you know, we were talking earlier about how people are
Speaker 1: always just sort of wanting to pick your brain and
Speaker 1: get advice about how these things shape so much of
Speaker 1: our discourse. So you were telling me about this new
Speaker 1: thing that you're doing called office hours.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so office hours really born out of getting loads
Speaker 3: and loads of questions as to how on earth to
Speaker 3: deal with this new media sphere right from podcasting which
Speaker 3: we're doing right now, to social to newsletters to everything
Speaker 3: else in between, how to actually activate in this space
Speaker 3: and basically office hours. You can book it for an hour,
Speaker 3: you can book it for a half hour. You get
Speaker 3: to pick my brain on strategy development across the board.
Speaker 3: It can really be anything across that larger comm space again,
Speaker 3: whether it's marketing, PR, strategy, social, understanding what you're seeing online,
Speaker 3: how to actually develop a strategy, how to react, what works,
Speaker 3: what doesn't, everything in that bucket and more. You're able
Speaker 3: to book an office hour and chat with me about
Speaker 3: it and we can figure out bust path forward for
Speaker 3: what you're working on. And I do this on the
Speaker 3: political end of things, but I also do it in
Speaker 3: the consumer space too, So everybody's welcome at office hours,
Speaker 3: and you can a book of time with your link
Speaker 3: in bios situation.
Speaker 1: It is always a classic, so well put the link
Speaker 1: for folks to join in the bio. But it is
Speaker 1: really important like I used to do, like disinfo trainings
Speaker 1: and media trainings, and I think especially right now when
Speaker 1: as you said, the media landscape is shipping, so quickly
Speaker 1: that it can be really hard for folks to get
Speaker 1: a handle on it, like it's hard for me sometimes.
Speaker 1: And so I think that's a valuable service that you're offering.
Speaker 1: And I actually know somebody who I think could probably be.
Speaker 2: Like, take good use of this.
Speaker 1: And that is the last story that I want to
Speaker 1: want to talk about, which is that readers who read
Speaker 1: fantasy author Lena McDonald's book called Dark Hollow Academy Year
Speaker 1: two noticed an interesting editing note embedded into chapter three
Speaker 1: that suggested that she might have used AI to write
Speaker 1: this book. The note said, like Sandwiched in between the
Speaker 1: regular dialogue of the book, there was a note that said,
Speaker 1: I've rewritten the passage to align more with Jabree's style,
Speaker 1: which features more tension, gritty undertones, and raw emotional subtext
Speaker 1: beneath the supernatural elements. So not only was this author
Speaker 1: using AI, allegedly she did not delete the AI note
Speaker 1: that made an end of her published book, and she
Speaker 1: was using AI to make her writing sound more like
Speaker 1: another person's writing.
Speaker 2: When I tell you, I would simply.
Speaker 1: Have to die, like like I don't know if there
Speaker 1: would be any coming back from this, Like I would
Speaker 1: be so embarrassed.
Speaker 2: I would pack it up.
Speaker 3: No, literally, like you've never seen me again. I'd be
Speaker 3: off on some island with no Wi Fi and just
Speaker 3: maybe a nice little canoe like that would be truly all.
Speaker 3: And it reminds me of I'm blinking on her name.
Speaker 3: But she's a cookbook author and this wasn't her fault
Speaker 3: at all. The editor unfortunately missed it. But there, I
Speaker 3: guess for an image of her was a note left
Speaker 3: in the book to like tone her arms more. Ah,
Speaker 3: and all the copies went out like just horrendous. I
Speaker 3: think it was I don't think it was her first
Speaker 3: book at used. And again it wasn't her, It was,
Speaker 3: you know, sort of the editor, which I still feel
Speaker 3: badly for because obviously that was not their intent. But yikes, yikes,
Speaker 3: And it makes me just think about how one of
Speaker 3: the areas of expertise that we really have let lead
Speaker 3: out our editors, right, people that catch these things, that
Speaker 3: do the due diligence, that go back through things. We
Speaker 3: look at technology and we go, oh, it's gonna it's
Speaker 3: got us, It's fine. I can't delain how many times
Speaker 3: I've controlled f on a spreadsheet and it's missed something, Okay.
Speaker 3: So I just think that the the personal touch, the
Speaker 3: human to human does get some of the things that
Speaker 3: are missed, and that is just so wild and uncomfortable,
Speaker 3: and I just, yeah, I don't know what one does.
Speaker 3: I mean, I could probably think of a pr way
Speaker 3: out of that one I have met, but yikes, that's
Speaker 3: that's a long road. That's definitely not a quick fix,
Speaker 3: I'll tell you that much.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Lena reached out to Sammy for some crisis comes.
Speaker 1: But it's also it's just a good reminder that, like,
Speaker 1: there are so many reasons why people should be careful
Speaker 1: about the way they use AI, particularly in their creative work.
Speaker 1: You know, so many reasons why you should be If
Speaker 1: you're gonna use AI, you need to really be careful.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 1: But the biggest one now is like you could be
Speaker 1: horribly embarrassed all across the internet when your AI note
Speaker 1: is published in your fucking book.
Speaker 2: My god, so bad, so bad.
Speaker 3: I just hope that if she does decide to write
Speaker 3: another book, that AI as just in its existence right,
Speaker 3: is integrated into the storyline. Oh yeah, that would be
Speaker 3: like a way to partially solve it. I fel like,
Speaker 3: actually it was any drag you guys caught it again.
Speaker 3: I'd have to read the book. I really think if
Speaker 3: that was a good strategy or not. But you know
Speaker 3: there's something.
Speaker 1: This is why you're the pr master, Sammy. People, that
Speaker 1: was actually quite masterful.
Speaker 3: Thank you, Thank you, Sammy.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for being here and helping us
Speaker 1: a break down all of these stories across the internet.
Speaker 1: Where can folks keep up with all the things that
Speaker 1: you are doing across the internet.
Speaker 3: Well, thank you so much for having me. This has
Speaker 3: been so much fun. You can all tap in at
Speaker 3: groolmigov dot com. You can find the newsletters there and
Speaker 3: then for social Girl on the GUV and Girl on
Speaker 3: the Gov the podcast.
Speaker 1: Check it out. It is a very useful newsletter. The
Speaker 1: podcast is great. You all talk to like legitimately important people,
Speaker 1: like elected officials and like have genuinely important conversations that
Speaker 1: are impactful for everyday lives.
Speaker 2: I really really respect what y'all are doing.
Speaker 3: Thank you. Yeah, it's been crazy. Sometimes I forget that
Speaker 3: we've interviewed some of these movers and shakers myself in
Speaker 3: this you know, just that way that your career sometimes
Speaker 3: moves are like oh yeah, I can't believe I did
Speaker 3: x y Z. Thanks, but we've done it and there
Speaker 3: are some definitely some interesting conversations on the podcast feed
Speaker 3: and then also on the social we've been mini micin
Speaker 3: it up. Okay, those mini mics are living ten lives.
Speaker 5: I'll tell you that much.
Speaker 2: Given them a workout.
Speaker 3: Well.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for being here, and if folks
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Speaker 1: Joey pat Jonathan Strickland is our executive producer. Tari Harrison
Speaker 1: is our producer and sound engineer. Michael Amado is our
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