WEBVTT - Bonus Episode - Pelosi’s Attacker Credits GamerGate with His Radicalization 0:00:00.960 --> 0:00:03.240 So it felt like all of the different topics we're 0:00:03.279 --> 0:00:06.440 going to be exploring on Internet Hate Machine kind of 0:00:06.480 --> 0:00:10.240 all intersected last week with the finalization of Elon Musk 0:00:10.360 --> 0:00:13.920 taking over Twitter, the attack on Nancy Pelosi's husband Paul 0:00:14.200 --> 0:00:16.440 by a man armed with a hammer, and of course 0:00:16.920 --> 0:00:20.680 Elon Musk using his newly purchased social media platform to 0:00:20.800 --> 0:00:25.079 spread baseless conspiracy theories about the attack. Now, according to 0:00:25.160 --> 0:00:29.480 Paul Pelosi's alleged attackers own writings online, it was gamer 0:00:29.480 --> 0:00:33.320 Gate that he credited was providing a gateway into extremism 0:00:33.360 --> 0:00:37.360 and conspiracy theories. And you know, I started this podcast 0:00:37.400 --> 0:00:40.000 to explore the ways that the Internet can have a 0:00:40.159 --> 0:00:44.120 big impact on our social and political landscape, and honestly, 0:00:44.440 --> 0:00:47.720 sometimes I kind of hate being right about it because 0:00:47.760 --> 0:00:51.440 online movements like gamer Gate are still harming our political 0:00:51.560 --> 0:00:56.040 landscape today. And Dr Joan Donovan, research director at the 0:00:56.080 --> 0:00:59.639 Harvard Kennedy Shortenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy, 0:01:00.160 --> 0:01:05.080 co author of the book Memoirs, is not surprised. Dr Donovan, 0:01:05.120 --> 0:01:07.240 thank you so much for being here. So were you 0:01:07.319 --> 0:01:10.880 surprised to find out that Paul Pelosi's attacker credited gamer 0:01:10.920 --> 0:01:15.400 Gate as being a political turning point for him. Unfortunately, 0:01:15.760 --> 0:01:20.279 in this world that I work in, I very rarely 0:01:20.319 --> 0:01:24.039 am surprised. So why this is important, of course, is 0:01:24.080 --> 0:01:28.640 that there are moments in our Internet history that many 0:01:28.680 --> 0:01:33.520 people consider landmark moments. For on the right, they call 0:01:33.560 --> 0:01:37.000 it getting red pilled, right, And so the red pill 0:01:37.080 --> 0:01:41.600 is a UM reference to the matrix. You can either 0:01:41.640 --> 0:01:44.240 take the blue pill and live your life as if 0:01:44.280 --> 0:01:46.880 nothing is going on. You take the red pill and 0:01:46.959 --> 0:01:49.320 you can see the world for what it is. And 0:01:49.360 --> 0:01:52.800 there were many things going on during gamer Gate, UM, 0:01:52.960 --> 0:02:01.640 particularly violent misogyny, anti black racism, homophobia, transphobia. So within 0:02:01.800 --> 0:02:04.920 gamer Gate, there were many ways in which someone could 0:02:04.920 --> 0:02:08.959 have become red pilled or awoke into this world where 0:02:09.000 --> 0:02:13.440 they think they're finally seeing reality for the first time. UM. 0:02:13.480 --> 0:02:18.880 And this is intensely problematic generally because the way in 0:02:18.960 --> 0:02:25.080 which this starts usually is by digging into more and 0:02:25.120 --> 0:02:29.000 more media online. So you move away from mainstream media, 0:02:29.680 --> 0:02:32.800 you think the mainstream media is there simply to lie 0:02:32.840 --> 0:02:36.760 to you, and you start to go into these different 0:02:37.280 --> 0:02:40.360 rabbit holes trying to understand, well, then how do I 0:02:40.400 --> 0:02:43.519 get how do I make sense of this world? Conspiracies 0:02:43.560 --> 0:02:47.320 tend to fill that void. The difference with gamer Gate, though, 0:02:47.440 --> 0:02:50.639 is that this was um a real, a real set 0:02:50.680 --> 0:02:55.480 of events that we're happening and unfolding in this moment 0:02:55.639 --> 0:03:05.800 where it wasn't just that we were seeing um, misogynistic, racist, homophobic, transphobic, 0:03:06.080 --> 0:03:10.160 inciting content moving around online. It was also starting to 0:03:10.200 --> 0:03:14.720 show up in people's real lives and we saw the 0:03:14.919 --> 0:03:21.760 violence of swatting and the harassments and um even intimidating 0:03:21.840 --> 0:03:26.800 people at their workplaces, in their homes or at conferences. 0:03:26.919 --> 0:03:31.799 And so it was a very different time as well. 0:03:32.800 --> 0:03:35.360 And this maybe will be the last point I'll say 0:03:35.360 --> 0:03:39.560 on this, is it during gamer Gate people learned these 0:03:39.640 --> 0:03:45.960 trolls and these misogynists, uh, these racists, all these ILKs 0:03:46.760 --> 0:03:50.400 of of people learned how to coordinate with one another. 0:03:51.000 --> 0:03:55.280 So it goes back even before gamer Gate and different 0:03:55.320 --> 0:04:00.600 campaigns that most famously probably is your slipsh Knowing, which 0:04:00.640 --> 0:04:06.920 I know that you've covered as well, UM, where black 0:04:06.920 --> 0:04:09.680 feminists were able to figure out very early on that 0:04:09.720 --> 0:04:13.480 they were being impersonated on Twitter, uh, and we're able 0:04:13.520 --> 0:04:17.560 to show what those accounts meant, um and what what 0:04:17.640 --> 0:04:20.039 they were up to, and how easy it is to 0:04:20.120 --> 0:04:24.040 manipulate the system, are the design of social media in 0:04:24.120 --> 0:04:29.799 order to produce this targeted harassment, And so I wouldn't 0:04:29.839 --> 0:04:32.760 be surprised, although I don't have any evidence of it yet, 0:04:32.760 --> 0:04:36.960 that moments like that as well, that are highly participatory, 0:04:36.960 --> 0:04:42.440 that have these instantaneous feelings of reward and camaraderie for 0:04:42.520 --> 0:04:45.200 getting someone to shape you know, shut down their account, 0:04:45.960 --> 0:04:49.800 getting them to block you, whatnot, is definitely something that 0:04:49.880 --> 0:04:54.920 we see many unfortunately many of the folks that end 0:04:55.000 --> 0:04:58.880 up being part of these movements over the long term, uh, 0:04:59.040 --> 0:05:03.160 participate in early on. Yeah, it's interesting that you bring 0:05:03.160 --> 0:05:07.160 that up on this series. We're starting with HB. R. Richards, 0:05:07.200 --> 0:05:11.160 you know, dongle Gate, and you know, this this thing 0:05:11.240 --> 0:05:13.520 that I think a lot of people, even people who 0:05:13.520 --> 0:05:16.560 were pretty online might have seen as like a blip, 0:05:17.040 --> 0:05:20.719 but to me really marks something interesting, an interesting shift 0:05:20.760 --> 0:05:23.719 around exactly what you were talking about. This the reward 0:05:23.839 --> 0:05:26.240 of feeling like, oh, we got this person to you know, 0:05:26.839 --> 0:05:28.760 shut up online or to get or to lose their 0:05:28.880 --> 0:05:32.360 job or to you know, you know, shut down their 0:05:32.360 --> 0:05:35.839 accounts or block people like that, having a sort of 0:05:35.920 --> 0:05:40.279 instantaneous reward for folks and that being like a participatory 0:05:40.320 --> 0:05:44.039 thing that people would want to take part in. Yeah, 0:05:44.120 --> 0:05:47.000 and that's I think that actually speaks to the changing 0:05:47.080 --> 0:05:51.000 nature of political participation. Uh. You know, when we first 0:05:51.000 --> 0:05:56.359 started to think about the Internet as a political space, blogs, 0:05:56.680 --> 0:05:59.880 everybody had a blog, they had a political opinion then. 0:06:00.000 --> 0:06:03.360 And you start to see, slowly, beginning with the so 0:06:03.440 --> 0:06:08.039 called Arab Spring, people are using the Internet to get coordinated, 0:06:08.480 --> 0:06:11.400 and they're doing it to get coordinated in public space. 0:06:12.120 --> 0:06:16.080 And I think what the far right does really, uh, 0:06:16.440 --> 0:06:19.359 what the far right really adds to this set of 0:06:19.400 --> 0:06:22.760 tactics is they have these hybrid sets of tactics where 0:06:23.720 --> 0:06:27.880 they do a lot of online organizing and the point 0:06:28.279 --> 0:06:34.719 is to upset or defame someone online. And it's it's 0:06:34.760 --> 0:06:38.400 for them, almost just as effective as you know, showing 0:06:38.480 --> 0:06:41.120 up at the mayor's house and protesting in front of 0:06:41.120 --> 0:06:44.599 his house until he resigns. Right. For them, the winds 0:06:44.640 --> 0:06:48.039 are a lot the goals, and the winds tend to 0:06:48.040 --> 0:06:49.919 be a lot smaller, but they also tend to be 0:06:50.960 --> 0:06:56.600 quite a bit more personally painful for people who become 0:06:56.680 --> 0:07:01.440 targets of this kind of harassment and h When it 0:07:01.480 --> 0:07:05.680 comes to what we've seen in the social media of 0:07:05.800 --> 0:07:11.440 the man who attacked Mr. Pelosi is is that he 0:07:11.560 --> 0:07:15.440 had really following, followed along with a lot of the 0:07:15.520 --> 0:07:20.679 more mainstream Internet conspiracy theories. Uh, it's not the case 0:07:20.760 --> 0:07:25.360 that he's in things that are it's well, you know this, 0:07:26.040 --> 0:07:30.520 there's like the internet, and and there's the internet where 0:07:30.760 --> 0:07:34.160 there's things that are popular that nobody has ever heard of. 0:07:34.760 --> 0:07:36.960 But he seems to be in that popular vein of 0:07:37.040 --> 0:07:40.960 conspiracy and he's following along, which denotes to me that 0:07:41.000 --> 0:07:43.520 he was part of a community that he was, you know, 0:07:43.600 --> 0:07:46.360 listening to other people and following along, thinking he was 0:07:46.400 --> 0:07:50.640 doing his own research. Um, but ultimately he was being 0:07:50.680 --> 0:07:54.120 fed all of these lies and and the way that 0:07:55.400 --> 0:08:01.640 these things start to plug together around election denialism and 0:08:01.880 --> 0:08:07.240 in the subversion of the US democratic process. Um, if 0:08:07.320 --> 0:08:10.840 you truly do believe that all else has been tried 0:08:10.880 --> 0:08:16.240 and failed, the only recourse people feel that they have 0:08:16.440 --> 0:08:22.680 is violence and um. Reading some of the pronouncements of 0:08:22.720 --> 0:08:26.000 this man where he says, you know, he wanted to 0:08:26.240 --> 0:08:29.560 break Nancy Pelosi's kneecaps so that she would be a 0:08:29.600 --> 0:08:36.240 reminder to politicians that you can't just lie, and that 0:08:36.360 --> 0:08:42.400 it's that kind of delusional belief in one's own power. Uh. 0:08:42.960 --> 0:08:46.679 That makes people move from the wires to the weeds, 0:08:46.720 --> 0:08:50.000 and this what is perceived as a very lone wolf 0:08:50.160 --> 0:08:53.840 kind of way. But um, that's not to say that 0:08:53.920 --> 0:08:58.920 this person hadn't been supported in part of communities online 0:08:59.480 --> 0:09:03.520 before he ended up taking these last steps. I would 0:09:03.559 --> 0:09:06.679 imagine that for a lot of people, the idea that 0:09:06.760 --> 0:09:12.160 this movement online of guys who were big mad about 0:09:12.200 --> 0:09:15.400 ethics and gaming journalism in scare quotes would then be 0:09:15.520 --> 0:09:19.480 related to this like political attack on Nancy Pelosi's husband. 0:09:19.600 --> 0:09:22.080 Do you think we're gonna start seeing more people making 0:09:22.080 --> 0:09:26.319 that connection of those two of those two things being related. Well, 0:09:26.360 --> 0:09:30.200 what's interesting I think is um a few things, which 0:09:30.240 --> 0:09:35.679 is that we are getting a lot of different vantage 0:09:35.679 --> 0:09:39.480 points from which to tell the history of gamer Gate. 0:09:39.600 --> 0:09:42.720 You can tell the story through the tactics of resistance 0:09:43.360 --> 0:09:46.320 uh in our book, um, or you could tell the 0:09:46.360 --> 0:09:49.320 story from the vantage point of how mass media covered it. 0:09:49.840 --> 0:09:52.719 In our book, we really wanted to understand the relationship 0:09:52.800 --> 0:09:57.440 between Steve Bannon and Milo U and Opolis and the 0:09:57.520 --> 0:10:01.000 way in which Milo A. Rich only had come out 0:10:01.080 --> 0:10:05.599 and thought Gamergate was dumb and he misread the audience. 0:10:05.880 --> 0:10:09.000 He missed it, and so he had to do Amia 0:10:09.080 --> 0:10:12.800 Cupola and come back and say, yes, this is about 0:10:12.840 --> 0:10:16.800 ethics and gaming journalism. And because he had the platform 0:10:16.840 --> 0:10:21.480 of bright Bart, it gave that movement the belief in 0:10:21.559 --> 0:10:25.440 their own legitimacy. Because that's what media really does, is 0:10:25.480 --> 0:10:30.280 it makes people feel legitimate and recognized and seen. That's 0:10:30.320 --> 0:10:35.280 why all movements strive to have media coverage. Um and 0:10:35.360 --> 0:10:38.400 so in meanmore is, as we were trying to tell 0:10:38.480 --> 0:10:43.280 that story, it was really important that we looked at 0:10:43.360 --> 0:10:47.680 and tried to show how some of those tactics that 0:10:48.960 --> 0:10:52.000 Milo is part of organizing, that we're being organized on 0:10:52.080 --> 0:10:56.760 four Chan, then get filtered through someone like Steve Bannon, 0:10:56.840 --> 0:11:02.320 who is the bridge between these online populist movements and 0:11:03.880 --> 0:11:06.960 the President of the United States and the Republican Party. 0:11:07.000 --> 0:11:10.280 And and you see this dramatic shift in how Trump 0:11:10.400 --> 0:11:16.240 uses his own social media how you know, um white 0:11:16.240 --> 0:11:20.199 House media and media properties as you as used once. 0:11:21.040 --> 0:11:28.040 These um uh folks who are learning from that very 0:11:28.080 --> 0:11:32.680 online contingent of people are learning how to take those 0:11:32.720 --> 0:11:38.000 tactics and move them into mainstream politics. I mean, there's 0:11:38.040 --> 0:11:42.880 really nothing fundamentally that different from what was happening during 0:11:42.920 --> 0:11:47.520 game or gate to when Trump is pointing at CNN 0:11:47.520 --> 0:11:52.040 and calling it fake news. Right, It's it's almost the 0:11:52.120 --> 0:11:57.400 same narrative. It's really about ethics and mainstream journalism, right. 0:11:57.520 --> 0:12:01.800 And I think one as we start to think through, well, 0:12:01.840 --> 0:12:06.440 what are people asking for from media? Does mainstream media 0:12:06.520 --> 0:12:10.199 have a responsibility to tell the truth? If it does, 0:12:10.480 --> 0:12:13.040 then what is this partisan media that we're paying a 0:12:13.080 --> 0:12:17.400 lot of attention to do we allow news organizations that 0:12:17.400 --> 0:12:21.400 are partisan to call themselves news? It becomes much more 0:12:21.440 --> 0:12:26.439 complicated question once we realize that the tactics that seemed 0:12:26.640 --> 0:12:30.840 jokey and small and part of low culture then become 0:12:32.200 --> 0:12:37.680 mainstream political tactics. And uh. And there's a lot to 0:12:37.720 --> 0:12:40.840 be said though for studying the resistance to that and 0:12:40.960 --> 0:12:45.040 figuring out, well, how did people get through game or GIT? 0:12:45.160 --> 0:12:48.720 How did feminists come out the other side? Um? Which 0:12:48.720 --> 0:12:52.160 I know some of your some of your own research 0:12:52.200 --> 0:12:57.400 and podcasting has done. Uh. But there is a disconnect 0:12:57.440 --> 0:13:01.880 here between that style of existence that tends to happen 0:13:02.440 --> 0:13:08.720 within communities. There's no real connection between that in any 0:13:08.800 --> 0:13:13.479 political party type of way. Right, You don't see um, 0:13:13.600 --> 0:13:18.160 the same kind of sutures like you do on the right, 0:13:18.360 --> 0:13:24.120 between the internet world and the party. Uh So there 0:13:24.240 --> 0:13:28.679 is some work to think about related to the gamer 0:13:28.720 --> 0:13:34.839 Gate tactics becoming mainstream political tactics. There's a lot of 0:13:34.880 --> 0:13:37.160 work to think through, well what is the resistance to 0:13:37.240 --> 0:13:41.160 that look like? And are there politicians that are willing 0:13:41.240 --> 0:13:44.640 to take up the charge and make sure that those 0:13:44.679 --> 0:13:52.000 resistance tactics get the same kind of value and attention 0:13:52.360 --> 0:13:56.880 as all of the bad the baddies, you know, it's 0:13:56.920 --> 0:14:00.120 all the bad guys online. That's such an interest in 0:14:00.240 --> 0:14:03.200 point that I didn't even really think about because you know, 0:14:04.120 --> 0:14:08.240 Bannon clearly had a lot of takeaways about how those 0:14:08.280 --> 0:14:11.000 tactics could be used to build political power on the right, 0:14:11.440 --> 0:14:15.480 and we don't similarly have a kind of infrastructure that 0:14:15.520 --> 0:14:19.480 then asks well, how did feminists and black women online, 0:14:19.960 --> 0:14:23.320 you know, like resist to this? How did they How 0:14:23.320 --> 0:14:25.960 did they lean into the power of community to to 0:14:26.200 --> 0:14:29.400 strengthen their own online spaces even when in people with 0:14:29.440 --> 0:14:32.240 institutional power really didn't help them. And so we don't 0:14:32.240 --> 0:14:36.760 really have that same level of interest I guess in 0:14:36.960 --> 0:14:40.840 how we then support that same kind of resistance that 0:14:40.920 --> 0:14:43.480 there is on the right. Yeah, I mean it's a 0:14:43.520 --> 0:14:46.680 tricky it's a tricky thing. I've talked in the past 0:14:46.720 --> 0:14:53.160 with Ruhab Benjamin about this and about tactical UH disclosures 0:14:53.200 --> 0:14:56.800 because you don't want what you don't want happening. Is 0:14:57.600 --> 0:15:00.520 many much mainstream attention to the tech picks that are 0:15:00.520 --> 0:15:04.160 working when they're working, because usually when we're talking about 0:15:04.240 --> 0:15:11.000 community UH safety, we're talking about instances where community members 0:15:11.000 --> 0:15:15.840 have figured out an insideline to get things done, either 0:15:15.920 --> 0:15:19.280 to get corporations to change their minds about something I'm 0:15:19.280 --> 0:15:23.720 thinking here about the the organizing um of color of 0:15:23.840 --> 0:15:27.480 change around blood money and getting PayPal and other payment 0:15:27.560 --> 0:15:33.840 services to stop paying white supremacists. UM. Those tactics they 0:15:33.920 --> 0:15:38.960 feel very ephemeral because I think, you know, they've been 0:15:39.520 --> 0:15:44.840 I mean, they've been um historicized by academics, but they 0:15:44.880 --> 0:15:51.640 haven't been taken up as serious policy by politicians. So 0:15:51.680 --> 0:15:55.400 when I would say that when we talk about institutional support, 0:15:55.960 --> 0:15:59.840 you know, academics can take it far, but really what 0:16:00.040 --> 0:16:05.920 we need is that layered or that muscle between those 0:16:06.000 --> 0:16:12.000 resistance tactics translated into policy so that we can change 0:16:12.040 --> 0:16:15.320 the design and not just try to change, you know, 0:16:15.680 --> 0:16:25.960 one by one the bad actors in the work that 0:16:26.000 --> 0:16:28.080 he and I do. So much of the work that 0:16:28.120 --> 0:16:32.120 we're doing is like focused on individual bad actors or 0:16:32.160 --> 0:16:34.880 individual and it just feels like playing whack a mole. 0:16:35.040 --> 0:16:39.400 And it is, you know, it's what we're doing, but 0:16:39.680 --> 0:16:42.480 it never feels like enough. It feels like even if 0:16:42.520 --> 0:16:45.320 we were doing even if we were worked doing this 0:16:45.360 --> 0:16:47.680 work at the capacity that we you know, like working 0:16:47.680 --> 0:16:50.120 at seven, it wouldn't be enough. We need we need 0:16:50.280 --> 0:16:54.960 infrastructure change, We need deeper, more meaningful changes, because you know, 0:16:56.000 --> 0:16:58.800 banning deep platforming a bad actor here and there is great, 0:16:58.880 --> 0:17:04.119 but it's not going to have that like lasting change. Yeah, 0:17:04.200 --> 0:17:07.480 and I you know, that's where we end up at 0:17:07.480 --> 0:17:10.200 the end of our book. Really is this idea that 0:17:10.840 --> 0:17:14.760 the design has to be much more intentional. You know, 0:17:14.800 --> 0:17:19.720 if you think about Musk buying Twitter, Twitter is the 0:17:19.760 --> 0:17:25.800 most influential news distribution system in the world. Now, it 0:17:25.880 --> 0:17:30.919 was never designed purposefully to transmit the news, right, and 0:17:31.000 --> 0:17:36.000 so Musk, who's now anti media, is in charge of it, 0:17:36.240 --> 0:17:38.919 and you know, you have to wonder where he's going 0:17:38.960 --> 0:17:42.200 to go with that. But it's certainly not going to 0:17:42.280 --> 0:17:48.560 be into you know, adding to the integrity of information online, right, um. 0:17:48.640 --> 0:17:52.119 And so you know, I do think that there are 0:17:52.160 --> 0:17:55.440 great academics out there that do that work of of 0:17:55.600 --> 0:17:58.120 working with movement. I'm thinking here of my my dear 0:17:58.160 --> 0:18:02.440 friend that you see or buying Roger Crowe, who work 0:18:02.560 --> 0:18:07.439 with movements and try to do research based upon the 0:18:07.520 --> 0:18:11.159 questions that they have. I do think it's really important, 0:18:11.600 --> 0:18:17.320 especially today, to keep our eyes on these the innovation 0:18:17.600 --> 0:18:22.959 and the kind of entrepreneurship of the far right, um, 0:18:23.119 --> 0:18:26.760 because of how important they are for culture in terms 0:18:26.760 --> 0:18:32.879 of shaping the culture, especially around certain issues that we 0:18:33.000 --> 0:18:40.520 cannot fail on. We cannot fail on fighting anti black racism, transphobia, 0:18:40.680 --> 0:18:46.840 especially these days. Um. You know, we have to fight 0:18:46.880 --> 0:18:49.320 for public health because the state's not going to do it. 0:18:50.080 --> 0:18:53.040 And so you know, I often think about it is 0:18:53.080 --> 0:18:58.919 this paradoxical process where I'm always trying to understand the 0:18:58.960 --> 0:19:01.840 broader system implications for it. But I'm never going to 0:19:01.920 --> 0:19:06.080 make the mistake of thinking that pro social movements use 0:19:06.200 --> 0:19:10.080 the same technology the same way than anti democratic ones 0:19:10.119 --> 0:19:13.399 do or white supremacists do. It might fundamentally be the 0:19:13.440 --> 0:19:17.480 same technology, but they bring to it different sets of values, 0:19:18.200 --> 0:19:24.919 different sets skill sets even uh, and make that platform 0:19:25.040 --> 0:19:29.399 or that media do something that other groups aren't able 0:19:29.440 --> 0:19:32.960 to or haven't really thought of yet. And that's why 0:19:32.960 --> 0:19:35.800 I think it's up to us to try to build 0:19:36.040 --> 0:19:38.800 more of a whole of society approach. We want to 0:19:38.800 --> 0:19:41.840 be working with technologists, we want to be working with 0:19:42.520 --> 0:19:46.760 UM librarians and educators, we want to be working with 0:19:47.320 --> 0:19:55.400 activists UM because we need to reshape the information ecosystem. 0:19:55.480 --> 0:20:00.199 And you know, it's a pretty dark day for a 0:20:00.240 --> 0:20:05.920 lot of people who formed really lasting and important friendships 0:20:06.000 --> 0:20:09.800 and social solidarities on Twitter, because if you can't trust 0:20:09.880 --> 0:20:12.679 the platform, it's going to be harder and harder to 0:20:12.720 --> 0:20:16.359 trust each other. And so it's going to be really 0:20:16.400 --> 0:20:22.600 important going forward that people find alternative spaces to have 0:20:22.800 --> 0:20:28.280 these broader, bigger picture conversations, especially UM people that live 0:20:28.320 --> 0:20:34.760 in diasporas that need to build global solidarities. UM. But it's, 0:20:36.280 --> 0:20:41.600 as I've been thinking about it, you know, it's in 0:20:41.720 --> 0:20:45.879 some ways, Musk is undoing the last decade of hard 0:20:45.960 --> 0:20:48.920 work of a lot of people, not just the people 0:20:48.960 --> 0:20:51.000 who work at Twitter, but a lot of people who 0:20:51.000 --> 0:20:56.560 have made these networks and friendships and organizations along the way. UM. 0:20:56.600 --> 0:20:58.200 Which is not to say that we have to throw 0:20:58.200 --> 0:21:01.399 that all away instant enviously, But I do think it 0:21:01.440 --> 0:21:07.280 gives us more of a mission driven focus on getting 0:21:07.280 --> 0:21:12.680 the infrastructure in place and um thinking about well, how 0:21:12.720 --> 0:21:16.280 could that infrastructure then be weaponized against us like it 0:21:16.440 --> 0:21:22.720 was during events like game or game. Yeah. I I've 0:21:22.720 --> 0:21:25.840 heard you speak and write really eloquently about the that 0:21:25.960 --> 0:21:29.600 the deep need to build a public interest internet and 0:21:29.680 --> 0:21:32.159 internet that has really meant conserved the people. But I 0:21:32.200 --> 0:21:33.800 also happen to know that you're a little bit of 0:21:33.840 --> 0:21:40.800 like a pessimist, that you aren't necessarily super Uh. Well, 0:21:40.840 --> 0:21:44.520 you tell me, how do you feel about that? I mean, 0:21:44.800 --> 0:21:49.600 you know, I I'm not Yeah, I'm not one to 0:21:50.480 --> 0:21:54.080 suggest that this is the whole of it, which is 0:21:54.119 --> 0:21:57.320 that if we get the technology right, all of a sudden, 0:21:57.560 --> 0:22:01.040 you know, what ails us in our society is somehow 0:22:01.080 --> 0:22:04.480 going to be fixed. UM. But I do know what 0:22:04.600 --> 0:22:08.480 it's like to live without the Internet. I am old 0:22:08.600 --> 0:22:13.280 enough to remember things were different, uh, and the scale 0:22:13.400 --> 0:22:19.640 was smaller and the achievements were smaller. Um. And so 0:22:19.680 --> 0:22:24.600 there's been a lot of forward social progress UM and 0:22:24.640 --> 0:22:29.479 a lot of accountability that has been uh you know, 0:22:29.640 --> 0:22:33.719 spread around as a result of social media UM. And 0:22:33.760 --> 0:22:37.720 we've seen new voices rise and fall, and that I 0:22:37.760 --> 0:22:39.960 think that's what I love about the Internet is the 0:22:40.000 --> 0:22:44.080 ability to meet and coordinate with people that are not 0:22:44.240 --> 0:22:47.440 like me, or people that are like me but are 0:22:47.520 --> 0:22:49.640 so far away from where I am that I never 0:22:49.640 --> 0:22:52.679 would have had the opportunity to meet them otherwise. And 0:22:52.720 --> 0:22:55.280 you know, you're talking to a punker that like booked 0:22:55.280 --> 0:22:58.040 their first tour on a o LL you know, like 0:22:58.680 --> 0:23:01.800 a l hardcore music chat room, right, Like that's where 0:23:01.800 --> 0:23:04.760 I come from. And so yeah, I think that there 0:23:04.800 --> 0:23:09.280 are things that are exciting, different possibilities that are exciting. Um. 0:23:09.359 --> 0:23:15.640 And each you know, group finds its platform in those 0:23:15.680 --> 0:23:20.480 platforms evolve. Um. And maybe it is the case that 0:23:21.280 --> 0:23:23.960 you know, when I was finding my identity of my people, 0:23:24.119 --> 0:23:27.399 my platform was the record player, right in the sense 0:23:27.480 --> 0:23:32.719 that like punk was still holding onto this you know, 0:23:32.800 --> 0:23:39.160 analog technology. Um. And but it created this whole culture 0:23:39.160 --> 0:23:45.359 of trading and and listening and making tapes for other people. 0:23:46.119 --> 0:23:48.680 It doesn't feel the same with Spotify. It almost feels 0:23:48.720 --> 0:23:50.960 like you're cheating when you're like, oh, yeah, I'll put 0:23:50.960 --> 0:23:55.200 you together a little mixtapep hear and ship it. Right. 0:23:55.720 --> 0:24:00.280 It just doesn't have the same time commitment, I think. 0:24:00.920 --> 0:24:04.199 But that's not to say that that's my experience, but 0:24:04.320 --> 0:24:06.520 that's not to say that that's the same experience of 0:24:06.600 --> 0:24:12.480 a young person who's like making videos and and expressing themselves. 0:24:12.520 --> 0:24:14.639 And those are the things that I think we're gonna 0:24:14.680 --> 0:24:19.320 lose if we don't step up to protect the health 0:24:19.320 --> 0:24:22.000 of the Internet now, and if we don't ask for 0:24:22.800 --> 0:24:29.240 layers of public infrastructure to ensure that one man with 0:24:29.680 --> 0:24:33.639 you know, billions of dollars can't take away something that 0:24:33.760 --> 0:24:39.440 has value for tens of millions or hundreds of millions 0:24:39.720 --> 0:24:45.760 UM as well. I think conversely, thinking about information in 0:24:45.800 --> 0:24:49.920 the public interest, the history of our journalism had to 0:24:49.960 --> 0:24:53.240 go through a process like this, you know, where journalists 0:24:53.280 --> 0:24:56.720 really had to think about how do we professionalize, how 0:24:56.760 --> 0:25:03.159 do we uh create information nation that is objective? UM. 0:25:03.160 --> 0:25:07.280 We don't always like that style of journalism, especially if 0:25:07.280 --> 0:25:11.560 it gets to both sides e especially if one side 0:25:11.640 --> 0:25:16.919 is lying. Um. But there's a method there and a 0:25:16.960 --> 0:25:19.520 commitment to ethics, and we don't have any of that 0:25:19.640 --> 0:25:21.960 at the backbone of our Internet. When it comes to 0:25:22.800 --> 0:25:26.359 these few companies that have really committed a smash and 0:25:26.400 --> 0:25:30.959 grab on our economy, and taken with it many of 0:25:31.040 --> 0:25:33.840 the many of much of the funding for our truth 0:25:33.840 --> 0:25:37.639 selling institutions. So you know, I'm I'm I'm a little 0:25:37.640 --> 0:25:41.199 bit optimistic about what we should build and how do 0:25:41.280 --> 0:25:43.119 we do it, and how do we make sure that 0:25:43.200 --> 0:25:49.320 it's serving the widest possible group. And I think that 0:25:49.359 --> 0:25:51.600 we do need to deal with some of our antitrust 0:25:51.680 --> 0:25:54.360 laws to get there and break up some of these 0:25:54.400 --> 0:26:02.120 companies that have bought and bought in everything. Um, but pessimistically, yeah, 0:26:02.240 --> 0:26:05.639 like I you know, the people that hate us aren't 0:26:05.640 --> 0:26:09.080 going away. They're not going away. They're not going to 0:26:09.160 --> 0:26:12.520 go away just because we build the most perfect technology. 0:26:12.640 --> 0:26:15.639 They're not going to go away if we build you know, 0:26:16.359 --> 0:26:19.800 gates around our properties either. It's just you know, at 0:26:19.840 --> 0:26:22.680 some point we have to reckon with each other. And 0:26:22.680 --> 0:26:27.439 and um, my commitment to life is always about dignity. 0:26:27.560 --> 0:26:29.240 You know, how do we make sure people live with 0:26:29.280 --> 0:26:35.199 dignity and that they live lives with you know, certain 0:26:35.240 --> 0:26:38.360 civil rights and and I do believe that the right 0:26:38.400 --> 0:26:41.679 to communication should be free. And I do think that 0:26:41.720 --> 0:26:46.919 the right to communication is critical, But I don't think 0:26:47.760 --> 0:26:51.840 that means you should be able to you know, politically 0:26:51.840 --> 0:26:56.120 oppress people, or that you should have access to broadcasting 0:26:56.160 --> 0:27:00.920 to eighty million people lies and disinformation, or hate, harassment 0:27:00.960 --> 0:27:06.640 and incitement. But I do you know, I I think 0:27:06.680 --> 0:27:13.439 I hold paradoxical opinions that maybe aren't completely reconcilable. Yeah, 0:27:13.520 --> 0:27:15.680 I mean, I just said that this is a non 0:27:15.720 --> 0:27:17.080 sec order. But I have to tell you when you 0:27:17.119 --> 0:27:21.680 were talking about the vibe of you know, records and 0:27:21.720 --> 0:27:24.600 making mix tapes, I was in a relationship with someone 0:27:24.640 --> 0:27:27.960 that I did not know was a big jam band fan. 0:27:28.240 --> 0:27:29.959 And then when we moved in together, I found all 0:27:30.000 --> 0:27:32.120 these boxes under the bed and I was like, what's 0:27:32.119 --> 0:27:34.840 in these boxes? And he was like, oh, yeah, I've 0:27:34.880 --> 0:27:38.000 been for ten years. I would go to parking lots 0:27:38.040 --> 0:27:41.240 where Grateful Dead concerts were happening, and I would trade 0:27:41.480 --> 0:27:45.000 and buy and sell bootlegs, and that's this. This is 0:27:45.000 --> 0:27:46.760 a box of most bootlegs. And I was like, what 0:27:46.840 --> 0:27:52.760 the hell, I mean, we are losing I know, yeah, 0:27:52.880 --> 0:27:57.920 and it's it's happening in different ways. I mean, yeah. 0:27:58.000 --> 0:28:00.280 I was just in Poland and I went to a 0:28:00.320 --> 0:28:04.359 party where, um, many of the people were in the 0:28:04.359 --> 0:28:07.160 crowd enjoying the music and the DJs, but they were 0:28:07.200 --> 0:28:11.159 making TikTok videos in the crowd, and I was just like, 0:28:11.240 --> 0:28:15.280 why are all these people videotaping themselves right while there's 0:28:15.320 --> 0:28:18.800