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Speaker 1: There Are No Girls on the Internet. As a production

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Speaker 1: of iHeartRadio and Unbossed Creative. I'm Bridget Todd and this

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Speaker 1: is There Are No Girls on the Internet.

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Speaker 2: Mike.

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Speaker 1: Thank you so much for being here.

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Speaker 3: As always, Bridget, thanks for having me. It's been a

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Speaker 3: little wild, but we've been some news and I'm excited

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Speaker 3: to hear all about it.

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Speaker 1: That's right. So here's what y'all might have missed this

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Speaker 1: week on the internet. And I'm excited to start with

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Speaker 1: a little bit of great news. It's great news for

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Speaker 1: our friends in the entertainment industry, but also I'll explain,

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Speaker 1: while it's great news for all of us, after one

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Speaker 1: hundred and eighteen very long days, making it the longest

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Speaker 1: strike in Hollywood's history, the Screen Actors Guild American Federation

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Speaker 1: of Television and Radio Artists otherwise known as sag AFTRA,

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Speaker 1: has reached a deal with the Alliance of Motion Picture

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Speaker 1: and Television Producers aka the Studios. So both sides have

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Speaker 1: been pretty quiet about the particular and specifics of what's

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Speaker 1: in this deal. But you know how on that episode

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Speaker 1: of Real Housewives of New York when Leunn Mary's Tom

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Speaker 1: and She's like, we got the yacht.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, it's like that we got the yacht.

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Speaker 1: Well we got Ai. That was the first thing I

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Speaker 1: thought when I heard when I was like hearing whispers

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Speaker 1: about the deal, I was like, we got the yacht,

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Speaker 1: but we got AI. Well, we probably got AI. At

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Speaker 1: least it seems like we got AI. So for folks

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Speaker 1: who don't know, AI was rightfully a major sticking point

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Speaker 1: in these negotiations. Here's how Wired reported it back in July.

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Speaker 1: Studios claim that they offered a quote groundbreaking AI proposal

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Speaker 1: that protects actors digital likeness. SAG was like, uh uh,

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Speaker 1: we don't think so, and countered that proposal, stipulating that

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Speaker 1: background performers per the proposal that studios that put forth

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Speaker 1: could be scanned, paid for the day, and then turned

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Speaker 1: into digital characters that studios could use for the rest

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Speaker 1: of eternity. Now the studios dispute this, but knowing the studios,

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Speaker 1: I don't know, it sounds plausible. Keep listening. So the

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Speaker 1: issue kind of went back and forth until last weekend,

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Speaker 1: when SAG reviewed what the studios were calling their last

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Speaker 1: best and final offer. SAG was like, I don't think

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Speaker 1: so fast, what else you got? They rejected that offer claiming, quote,

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Speaker 1: there are several essential items on which we still do

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Speaker 1: not have an agreement, including AI. So this is really wild.

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Speaker 1: A follow up story in The Hollywood Reporter revealed that

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Speaker 1: the studios had issued a proposal that would allow them

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Speaker 1: to pay for AI scans of some performers and then

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Speaker 1: following those performers as death. It would allow studios to

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Speaker 1: use scans without the consent of the estate or SAG.

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Speaker 1: So SAG wanted compensation for reuse of those scans along

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Speaker 1: with consent. Yeah, I'm pretty sure they did. Who wouldn't

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Speaker 1: want that incredibly basic respect for their labor protected, Like

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Speaker 1: the fact that studios were proposing that even in death,

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Speaker 1: some performers would have to have their likeness used without

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Speaker 1: consent for the rest of time. That is such a

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Speaker 1: wild proposal that I cannot believe studios would put it forth.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, anything anything where you've got a contract that lasts

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Speaker 3: for eternity for all of time, it's like a little

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Speaker 3: bit of a red flag, especially when it's something like

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Speaker 3: a likeness of an actor performing in a movie or

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Speaker 3: a TV show or a video of some sort that

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Speaker 3: is typically labor that a person gets paid for. If

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Speaker 3: studios are able to do that with somebody's likeness after

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Speaker 3: they're dead forever. That just feels like dark.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, it's pretty dark. I don't like the idea that

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Speaker 1: you could that we're signing contracts that have stipulations that

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Speaker 1: continue after we are dead, Like what is this?

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Speaker 3: Yeah? Right? And like I guess it's pretty common for

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Speaker 3: contracts that govern intellectual property to last for eternity, and

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Speaker 3: like that kind of makes sense because you're talking about

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Speaker 3: some sort of work that exists, But it just feels

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Speaker 3: so different when talking about labor or what would be

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Speaker 3: labor if it were done by a living person, But

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Speaker 3: it's like turning that living person into ip.

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Speaker 1: It really reminds me of the episode that we did

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Speaker 1: on the Whitney Houston Hologram m in Vegas. This hologram

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Speaker 1: of Whitney Houston with the with the permission of her

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Speaker 1: estate was doing a I guess a digital residency. I

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Speaker 1: don't know what they call it when a hologram is

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Speaker 1: doing a residency. It probably has some other name, but

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Speaker 1: we'll use the word residency and essentially what it means

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Speaker 1: when studios and executives get to make money off of

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Speaker 1: somebody's digital likeness just forever. Like it's like the zombification

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Speaker 1: of people having to work and make money for others

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Speaker 1: in eternity. It's really creepy.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, residency doesn't feel like the right word. Instantly feels

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Speaker 3: like more the right word right, Like we're not talking

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Speaker 3: about an artist, we're talking about an object exactly.

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Speaker 1: So again we don't know specifically what is in this deal,

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Speaker 1: but it's likely that SAD got at least some of

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Speaker 1: the AI provisions that they were asking for. So this

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Speaker 1: is huge and it really matters whether you're in entertainment

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Speaker 1: or an actor or a writer or not. Back when

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Speaker 1: the strike was first starting, writer Akila Hughes tweeted, not

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Speaker 1: to be hyperbolic, but this WGA strike is the canary

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Speaker 1: in the coal mine. If we don't stop this industry

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Speaker 1: from insane automation and devaluing wages, that's a rep that's dystopia.

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Speaker 1: Whatever your job is, they're going to get rid of

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Speaker 1: you so they can buy more yachts and pollute the

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Speaker 1: earth with more shit. This is the actual inflection point,

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Speaker 1: and I completely agree. I remember that that sentiment really

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Speaker 1: resonating with me. So to put all this in context,

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Speaker 1: just this week, the Tech Venture capital firm Anderson Horowitz

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Speaker 1: warned that billions of dollars of AI investments could be

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Speaker 1: worth a whole lot less if the companies who are

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Speaker 1: developing a technology are forced to pay for the copyrighted

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Speaker 1: data that makes them work. Or to put it another way, yo,

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Speaker 1: if we're not able to just steal from people to

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Speaker 1: make this to all work, we won't be able to

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Speaker 1: make the tons of money from AI like we were

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Speaker 1: planning to.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, I guess I agree with him. You know, it

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Speaker 3: makes sense if you can't just outright steal and you

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Speaker 3: have to pay for the stuff that you use. Yeah,

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Speaker 3: that's gonna really cut into your bottom line.

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Speaker 1: I mean, theft is lucrative. That's why people do it. Like,

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Speaker 1: I don't know, I don't know, Like yeah, but they're

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Speaker 1: just discovering this. It's like, yo, yo, if we're not

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Speaker 1: able to steal, how are we going to make money?

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Speaker 3: Yeah? Like, I love stuff, but I hate paying for it.

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Speaker 3: This seems like a natural solution. I'll just take it,

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Speaker 3: not pay for it.

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Speaker 1: It's called innovating, Mike. See, this is why this is

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Speaker 1: why we're not making the big tech dollars. It's called innovation.

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Speaker 1: It's called disrupting.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, we gotta do some disrupting of ownership.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, walk into a target and do a little disrupting.

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Speaker 1: You know, we're not advocating you from target. Do not

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Speaker 1: do that.

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Speaker 3: No, the joke is that stealing is wrong.

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Speaker 1: Okay. So to put this in conversation, Biden just put

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Speaker 1: out that executive order on AI last week. Did you

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Speaker 1: see that.

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Speaker 3: I did. Yeah, I saw it. I read it. It

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Speaker 3: was I thought it was pretty good.

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Speaker 1: And it does seem like we're at this inflection point

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Speaker 1: where everyone, perhaps except for the people who were poised

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Speaker 1: to make money from AI, has kind of come to

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Speaker 1: realize that a future where the wealthy get to exploit

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Speaker 1: and steal from the rest of us to get wealthier

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Speaker 1: with no oversight or no guardrails just is not it.

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Speaker 1: So I think if actors were able to get the

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Speaker 1: AI provisions that they were asking for, even some of

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Speaker 1: those provisions, I think it is a good sign. I

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Speaker 1: think it is going to be good for the rest

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Speaker 1: of us because it draws a line in the sand

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Speaker 1: that's like, no, you can't just exploit and steal and

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Speaker 1: grift your way into fatter pockets. We will not allow it.

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Speaker 2: That.

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Speaker 3: It's not the future, not if we have anything to

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Speaker 3: say about it.

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Speaker 2: Let's take a quick break at our back.

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Speaker 1: Okay, so there is a new Facebook whistleblower that we

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Speaker 1: absolutely need to be talking about.

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Speaker 3: New Facebook whistleblower just drupped.

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Speaker 1: New Facebook whistleblower just dropped. It is ar Turno Bihar,

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Speaker 1: a former Facebook engineering director from twenty nine to twenty

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Speaker 1: fifteen who later worked as a consultant at Instagram from

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Speaker 1: twenty nineteen to twenty twenty one. Bihar testified that top

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Speaker 1: Facebook officials, people like Mark Zuckerberg, Cheryl Sandberg, enemy of

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Speaker 1: the show, Adam Mosari, the head of Instagram, they did

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Speaker 1: not do enough to curb harm experience by their youngest

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Speaker 1: users on the platform.

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Speaker 3: Bridgie, I noticed you had a little extra venom in

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Speaker 3: your voice for Adam MUSERI what's the story there? You

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Speaker 3: had more for him than Zuckerberg?

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Speaker 1: Even wait, have we not talked about this on the show.

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Speaker 1: Maybe it's never come up why I hate him so much?

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Speaker 1: Because I do hate him more than the others.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, I don't think you've ever really gotten into it.

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Speaker 3: I mean close listeners of the show will notice a

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Speaker 3: pattern where you get a little extra edge in your

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Speaker 3: voice when talking about him, But what exactly is a

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Speaker 3: story bridget.

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Speaker 1: Ooh so Adam Osari, it's so personal and stupid. He

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Speaker 1: just rubs me the wrong way. I just get major

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Speaker 1: bad vibes from him and me saying that about a

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Speaker 1: tech leader, like a white guy tech leader, is really

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Speaker 1: something I think with people like Mark Zuckerberg, nobody looks

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Speaker 1: at Mark Zuckerberg and thinks this is somebody who is

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Speaker 1: meaningfully interested in creating a better world. You look at

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Speaker 1: Mark Zuckerberg and you know what he's about, You know

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Speaker 1: who he is, you know what he does. It's very clear.

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Speaker 1: Cheryl Sandberg, I feels a little different, but I don't

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Speaker 1: think and Cheryl Sanberg we have like met, we've had conversation,

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Speaker 1: well conversation singular, not plural, but again having met her,

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Speaker 1: you meet her and you like, you know who she is,

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Speaker 1: you know what she's about. A little bit more of

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Speaker 1: a pr slick vibe than Zuckerberg, but it's very clear.

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Speaker 1: Adam Mosseerri, I feel like it's doing a different thing

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Speaker 1: where he is trying to convince us that he's this

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Speaker 1: super quirky fun guy, like, oh, I'm wearing funky socks

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Speaker 1: and a sweater and like, my ties got a print

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Speaker 1: on it, and I'm wearing horned rimmed glasses. And he

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Speaker 1: also does this thing where he is often obviously with intention,

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Speaker 1: the face of announcements, and so if I follow him

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Speaker 1: on Instagram at this point, it's like I do it

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Speaker 1: for the show to get it, you know, whenever there's

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Speaker 1: updates or whatever, like I need to like know them.

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Speaker 1: But it's almost like a hate follower, where every time

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Speaker 1: his face shows up, I'm like, Oh, what is this

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Speaker 1: dork going to be trying to What is this hateful

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Speaker 1: dork going to be trying to convince us is actually

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Speaker 1: good for us while it actually harms people. And so Instagram,

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Speaker 1: as spokes probably know, was its own app before Facebook

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Speaker 1: thought it. It felt different, it felt good. Instagram essentially

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Speaker 1: bought it and then turned it into this like marketplace

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Speaker 1: for the pain of children apparently. And I just think

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Speaker 1: that Adam Mosseerri is trying to leverage this like quirky,

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Speaker 1: kind of non threatening, inoffensive, nice guy in the office

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Speaker 1: persona where he shows his face with intention when he

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Speaker 1: speaks to the public as a means to mask the

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Speaker 1: fact that the app actually does incredible harm to children,

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Speaker 1: is damaging children and that he's making money from it.

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Speaker 1: You look at Mark Zuckerberg and you're like, this is

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Speaker 1: a guy who's making money from the harm of children.

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Speaker 1: No trouble believing that. Cheryl Sandberg again, I'm like, well,

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Speaker 1: this is a woman who is like buying pantsuits via

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Speaker 1: the money that she made harmon kids. No trouble believing this.

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Speaker 1: I feel like Adam Moseiri wants us to think something

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Speaker 1: else when we look at him, and that's why I

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Speaker 1: hate him so much. It's like a very like I'm

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Speaker 1: sure people listening are like, wow, she really has strong

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Speaker 1: feelings about this, But I do believe he is leveraging

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Speaker 1: a persona of like quirky, non threatening guy in the

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Speaker 1: office with like funky thoughts to mask harm that he

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Speaker 1: is profiting from. That's just a fact. That's not me.

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Speaker 1: That's not me speculating he profits from harm and of sentence.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, all right, well, thanks for sharing your opinions about

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Speaker 3: that hateful dork.

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Speaker 1: I just feel like, if you're gonna have the audacity

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Speaker 1: to profit from the harm of children, don't do it

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Speaker 1: while wearing a funky sweater, like half the decency to

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Speaker 1: be like, yeah, of course I'm a hateful asshle Look

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Speaker 1: how I'm dressed.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, put on some like skeletor like armor or something.

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Speaker 1: So yeah, I mean yeah, So like why I hate

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Speaker 1: him as really grounded and the fact that like his

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Speaker 1: app harms kids, And that's exactly what Bihar is clarifying

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Speaker 1: from the inside. So basically, Bahar testified to the subcommittee,

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Speaker 1: and this comes after he published a bunch of leaked

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Speaker 1: internal information, including emails from his time work at Facebook,

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Speaker 1: to the Wall Street Journal. So his testimony basically confirms

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Speaker 1: what we already know, right all the stuff I just

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Speaker 1: said that Instagram was very aware that their product was

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Speaker 1: harming very young people and did nothing to address it,

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Speaker 1: and in fact, they prioritized time spent on platform as

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Speaker 1: a key performance indicator. Bihar released a trove of emails

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Speaker 1: showing exactly this. Something interesting about Bahar that really sets

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Speaker 1: him apart from earlier Facebook whistleblowers let people like Francis Hougan,

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Speaker 1: is that Bahar has a teenage daughter who, like a

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Speaker 1: lot of teenage daughters, his daughter was fourteenth at the

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Speaker 1: time uses Instagram. He saw that his own daughter was

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Speaker 1: getting continually harassed, as were her friends who were the

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Speaker 1: same age on Instagram, things like abusive, misogynistic comments and

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Speaker 1: unsolicited graphic pictures. He says. It is testimony. I asked,

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Speaker 1: why do boys keep doing that? His daughter replied, if

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Speaker 1: the only thing that happens to them is they get blocked,

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Speaker 1: why wouldn't they so this understandably deeply upset, he decided

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Speaker 1: to go back to work as a consultant at Facebook

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Speaker 1: to genuinely try to help them fix this issue and

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Speaker 1: to flag them to the top people. Here's a little

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Speaker 1: bit of his testimony.

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Speaker 4: She and her friends began having awful experiences, including repeated

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Speaker 4: unwanted sexual advances harassment. She reported these incidents to the company,

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Speaker 4: and it did nothing, in large part because of what

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Speaker 4: I learned as her father. On October of twenty nineteen,

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Speaker 4: I returned to Facebook, this time as a consultant with

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Speaker 4: Instagram's well being team. We tried to set goals based

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Speaker 4: on the experiences of teens themselves. Instead, the company wanted

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Speaker 4: to focus on enforcing its own narrowly defined policies, regardless

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Speaker 4: of whether that approach reduced the harm that teens were experiencing.

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Speaker 4: I discovered that most of the tools were kids that

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Speaker 4: we had put in place. During my earlier time Facebook

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Speaker 4: had been removed, I observed new features being developed in

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Speaker 4: response to public outcry, which were in reality kind of

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Speaker 4: a placebo, a safety feature in name only to placate

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Speaker 4: the praise and regulators. I say this because, rather than

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Speaker 4: being based on user experienced data that were based on

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Speaker 4: very deliberately narrow definitions of harm, the company was creating

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Speaker 4: its own homework.

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Speaker 1: Later, he makes clear something that I always kind of

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Speaker 1: suspected was happening at Facebook. But it's good to hear

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Speaker 1: validated from somebody who would know that Facebook does, indeed,

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Speaker 1: in his opinion, have the tools and the information to

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Speaker 1: make the platform safer for young people, but that it

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Speaker 1: actively chooses not to do so. In an interview with BBC,

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Speaker 1: he specifically said that Facebook should implement a button specifically

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Speaker 1: for young users that allows them to flag specifically unwanted

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Speaker 1: sexual advances. From firsthand knowledge working at Facebook, he says

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Speaker 1: that doing this is completely easy and totally plausible, but

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Speaker 1: he told BBC, I believe the reason that they're not

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Speaker 1: doing this is because there's no transparency about the harms

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Speaker 1: that teenagers are experiencing on Instagram. And that's why I'm

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Speaker 1: coming forward right now. This is my retirement from technology.

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Speaker 1: So it's interesting because Instagram already does have like a

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Speaker 1: general report button, like if somebody sends you a harassing

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Speaker 1: comment or a message, you can like generally report them.

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Speaker 1: But Bihar says that when you look at what they

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Speaker 1: know about how young people are actually using the platform,

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Speaker 1: that general report button is just not cutting it. He says,

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Speaker 1: research we did in twenty eleven shows that thirteen year

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Speaker 1: olds are uncomfortable with the word report because they worry

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Speaker 1: that themselves or somebody else is going to get in trouble.

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Speaker 1: Imagine you're a thirteen year old and you get an

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Speaker 1: unwanted sexual advance. How uncomfortable that is, how intense the

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Speaker 1: experience is, and there's nothing they can use to say, hey,

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Speaker 1: can you please help me with this? If that button

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Speaker 1: was available, then there will be data about who's initiating

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Speaker 1: those contacts. So Horr is really like, we need to

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Speaker 1: be setting our users up to give us more information

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Speaker 1: about the things that are experiencing on the platform, and that.

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Speaker 3: Will help makes sense. You know, as much as you

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Speaker 3: hate MUSEI I read an article earlier today that was

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Speaker 3: talking about some new court documents that had come out

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Speaker 3: I think connected with this or timed to go with

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Speaker 3: this hearing at the subcommittee, and the documents were pretty

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Speaker 3: damning about a lot of conversations that happened between Zuckerberg

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Speaker 3: and a lot of top executives at Facebook and Instagram,

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Speaker 3: including Adam Musseri, where the other executives were actually trying

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Speaker 3: to convince Zuckerberg to put some safeguards and some tools

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Speaker 3: into effect to protect young people, and it was Zuckerberg

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Speaker 3: personally that shot them all down. I thought that was

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Speaker 3: pretty interesting that they, you know, and I don't think

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Speaker 3: they were acting out of genuine concern for young people,

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Speaker 3: but they were concerned that this very that they were

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Speaker 3: going to find themselves in this position a couple of

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Speaker 3: years down the road of really being you know, sued

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Speaker 3: and looked at heart by legislators and regulators about their

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Speaker 3: lack of action. And I think that totally has come

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Speaker 3: true here.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, something tells me that was probably a bit of

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Speaker 1: a like do you ever use the phrase cover your ass?

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Speaker 2: Move?

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Speaker 3: Oh? Totally, it was entirely cover your ass, But you

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Speaker 3: know what, sometimes you want people's asses to be covered.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, if that's the only like way that

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Speaker 1: you're going to do the right thing is like, well,

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Speaker 1: I don't want this to be read and testimony in

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Speaker 1: front of lawmakers one day, so let's maybe stop harming

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Speaker 1: the kids. Yeah, I'll take it. If that's if that's

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Speaker 1: the best we got, the best we can hope far

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Speaker 1: from them, I'll take it.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, exactly. You know, I have no illusions that capitalists

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Speaker 3: and corporations are acting, you know, in the in the

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Speaker 3: public interest or to benefit society, right. They're acting in

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Speaker 3: their own selfish, selfish interest.

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Speaker 1: Uh.

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Speaker 3: And that's that's why they get fined when they do

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Speaker 3: egregious stuff.

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Speaker 1: I will say, though, this this thing about Zuckerberg personally

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Speaker 1: being like, no, I don't think we're gonna do this,

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Speaker 1: that does not surprise me. I can't tell you how

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Speaker 1: many times Facebook has made some sort of like horrible

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Speaker 1: policy decision that is really harmful and it turns out

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Speaker 1: that it was Mark Zuckerberg personally intervening to to institute

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Speaker 1: that policy. Alex Jones comes to mind that that Mark

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Speaker 1: Zuckerberg personally initiated a loophole to keep him on the

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Speaker 1: platform even after he was banned, right, And so yeah,

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Speaker 1: it doesn't surprise me that it's the very tippy tippy

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Speaker 1: top that is allowing this kind of harm to continue. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: so Bahar's testimony has really reignited convert stations around legislation

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Speaker 1: like the Kids Online Safety Act, which she might have cleaned.

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Speaker 1: If you've been listening to our other episodes, is not

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Speaker 1: legislation that we're really that hopeful about. This legislation and

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Speaker 1: other legislation that seeks to sort of reign in big

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Speaker 1: tech as it pertains to harming kids has kind of

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Speaker 1: stalled despite a lot of bipartisan support, and now lawmakers

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Speaker 1: are blaming big tech lobbying and big tech money. It

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Speaker 1: is an indictment of this body, to be honest with you,

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Speaker 1: that we have not acted. And we all know the

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Speaker 1: reason why big tech is the biggest, most powerful lobby

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Speaker 1: in the United States Congress. They successfully shut down every

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Speaker 1: meaningful piece of legislation. Do you have any idea which

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Speaker 1: lawmaker said that I'll give you a hint fist pumping

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Speaker 1: during the insurrection?

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Speaker 3: No really, Josh Holly, Yeah, that was a quote from

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Speaker 3: Subcommittee ranking Member Josh Holly election denying insurrection supporting Josh Holly.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, but I say that to say the kind of

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Speaker 1: strange bedfellows that have found themselves united on this issue.

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Speaker 1: And I think that is so interesting that people that

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Speaker 1: for whatever reason, I have my suspicion on those reasons,

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Speaker 1: but this is an issue that is really uniting people

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Speaker 1: across the aisle.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, you got to give Zuckerberg credit for that. He

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Speaker 3: really unites people.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, people hate him so much that they're like, we

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Speaker 1: gotta put our differences aside to take him down, or

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Speaker 1: might do it in a way that ends up harming

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Speaker 1: marginalized people, but like, that's how much we hate you.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, and we might just talk about it a lot

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Speaker 3: and not actually do anything. But don't worry. People are talking.

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Speaker 3: It's so frustrating because on the one hand, yeah, it

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Speaker 3: would be great to see bipartisan support to introduce some

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Speaker 3: legislation that would do something serious and meaningful to help

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Speaker 3: protect teenagers in particular, but really all of us from

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Speaker 3: the abuses of social media platforms and tech companies in general.

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Speaker 3: But the Kids Online Safety Act is not that totally.

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Speaker 1: So if you're thinking to yourself, gee, I haven't really

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Speaker 1: heard a whistleblower Arturo Bihar, don't feel too bad because

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Speaker 1: I hadn't really heard of him.

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Speaker 2: Either.

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Speaker 1: You know, I'd seen a few headlines, but I did

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Speaker 1: not listen to his testimony, and I didn't know about

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Speaker 1: his personal story and personal reasons for speaking up a

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Speaker 1: move that he said is effectively knowingly ending his career

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Speaker 1: in tech. And that's really one of the reasons why

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Speaker 1: I wanted to include him in this conversation today, because

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Speaker 1: I don't think he's really getting the attention nor the

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Speaker 1: seriousness that his testimony warrants. Think back to when Francis

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Speaker 1: Haugan became a whistleblower. She was everywhere I was thinking

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Speaker 1: about this, and Mike, you and I happened to be

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Speaker 1: traveling together when Francis Hagen blew the whistle on Facebook.

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Speaker 1: And I don't know if you remember, we were in

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Speaker 1: the hotel bar and they had a TV and they

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Speaker 1: were playing her sixty minutes interview on that TV in

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Speaker 1: the hotel bar like it was a pretty big deal.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, I do remember that it was. It was surprising

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Speaker 3: because hotel bars don't typically play sixty minutes.

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Speaker 1: No, they don't.

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Speaker 3: They doesn't like a news themed bar.

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Speaker 1: No, although wouldn't that be fun? And so I think

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Speaker 1: one of the reasons why Francis Hogan's testimony was everywhere,

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Speaker 1: and she was being treated a little bit differently than

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Speaker 1: whistleblowers like arturobahar Is that one. She was kind of

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Speaker 1: billed as the Facebook whistleblower, even though there were other

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Speaker 1: Facebook whistleblowers before her, women like Sophie Zong, who we

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Speaker 1: interviewed on the show. We'll link to her episode in

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Speaker 1: the show notes. Sophie spoke to this issue too, how

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Speaker 1: when you present a certain way as a whistleblower, you

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Speaker 1: will be more amplified and probably more supported, And if

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Speaker 1: you're not able to present in that certain way because

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Speaker 1: of your identity, you might be treated very differently. Sophie

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Speaker 1: was sort of framed as this disgruntled, poor performing former

435
00:23:56,760 --> 00:23:59,840
Speaker 1: employee of Facebook when she came forward as a whistle

436
00:23:59,840 --> 00:24:03,320
Speaker 1: blow or about Facebook's arms. Hagen was treated very differently.

437
00:24:03,720 --> 00:24:07,239
Speaker 1: And let's really keep it real, like Francis Hogan is

438
00:24:07,640 --> 00:24:12,600
Speaker 1: a blonde, wealthy, conventionally attractive white lady. I don't say

439
00:24:12,640 --> 00:24:14,960
Speaker 1: any of that to diminish her or her work or

440
00:24:15,000 --> 00:24:16,760
Speaker 1: the courage that it took for her to come forward

441
00:24:17,040 --> 00:24:21,000
Speaker 1: as a whistleblower. But our Turno Bihar is Latino and

442
00:24:21,119 --> 00:24:25,040
Speaker 1: he's also coming at this from like a very specific position,

443
00:24:25,520 --> 00:24:27,879
Speaker 1: that is of a parent, particularly a parent of a

444
00:24:27,880 --> 00:24:30,439
Speaker 1: teenager of color. You know, when we talk about the

445
00:24:30,480 --> 00:24:33,119
Speaker 1: impact of social media on young people on how parents

446
00:24:33,119 --> 00:24:35,600
Speaker 1: can support those young people, more often than not we

447
00:24:35,720 --> 00:24:39,879
Speaker 1: are talking about white young people. Yet research which is

448
00:24:39,960 --> 00:24:43,320
Speaker 1: mostly done on white youth is taken to be universal

449
00:24:43,400 --> 00:24:46,200
Speaker 1: for all youth, despite the fact that kids of color

450
00:24:46,240 --> 00:24:50,600
Speaker 1: are actually having like very unique and specific experiences online.

451
00:24:50,760 --> 00:24:53,720
Speaker 1: Researchers at the Youth Media and well Being Research Lab

452
00:24:54,000 --> 00:24:56,879
Speaker 1: found that black and Latino fifth through ninth graders adopt

453
00:24:56,960 --> 00:24:59,320
Speaker 1: social media at younger ages in their white peers, and

454
00:24:59,359 --> 00:25:02,080
Speaker 1: despite having the highest reported access to the Internet and

455
00:25:02,119 --> 00:25:06,280
Speaker 1: social media, Asian American youths still remain underrepresented and studies

456
00:25:06,280 --> 00:25:08,679
Speaker 1: on digital media and their well being Asian Americans in

457
00:25:08,760 --> 00:25:11,320
Speaker 1: later adolescents and early adulthood. So eighteen to twenty four

458
00:25:11,359 --> 00:25:14,080
Speaker 1: year olds are more likely to be cyberabully than their

459
00:25:14,080 --> 00:25:17,359
Speaker 1: white or Latino counterparts. They are also the least likely

460
00:25:17,400 --> 00:25:20,639
Speaker 1: to report negative experiences on social media in order to

461
00:25:20,680 --> 00:25:24,480
Speaker 1: avoid embarrassment and maintain a positive image to the outside world.

462
00:25:24,720 --> 00:25:28,760
Speaker 1: So Bahar as this whistleblower, the parent of a Latino

463
00:25:28,920 --> 00:25:32,760
Speaker 1: child and somebody who worked at Facebook is really filling

464
00:25:32,840 --> 00:25:36,120
Speaker 1: this gap and helping us understand this issue and how

465
00:25:36,160 --> 00:25:40,080
Speaker 1: it impacts marginalized youth and their parents. And I just

466
00:25:40,200 --> 00:25:44,880
Speaker 1: hope people listen, even if he's not a flashy, wealthy

467
00:25:45,119 --> 00:25:49,120
Speaker 1: white blonde woman with like a slick pr machine backing

468
00:25:49,119 --> 00:25:49,520
Speaker 1: her up.

469
00:25:54,320 --> 00:26:07,280
Speaker 2: Let's take a quick break at her back.

470
00:26:09,240 --> 00:26:12,680
Speaker 1: So, speaking of harm to use online, let's talk about omegle.

471
00:26:13,400 --> 00:26:18,879
Speaker 1: Quick heads up that this is involving sexual abuse of miners.

472
00:26:19,359 --> 00:26:23,040
Speaker 1: The platform o magle that instantaneously matched strangers with each

473
00:26:23,040 --> 00:26:26,359
Speaker 1: other for video chats a la chat roulette shut down

474
00:26:26,440 --> 00:26:30,240
Speaker 1: on Wednesday. So o'magle shutting down comes as part of

475
00:26:30,240 --> 00:26:32,280
Speaker 1: a settling of a lawsuit that was started in twenty

476
00:26:32,320 --> 00:26:34,600
Speaker 1: twenty one where a plaintiff was matched with a man

477
00:26:34,640 --> 00:26:37,439
Speaker 1: in his thirties through omagle. That man forced her to

478
00:26:37,480 --> 00:26:40,439
Speaker 1: take naked photos and videos over a three year period,

479
00:26:40,480 --> 00:26:43,440
Speaker 1: starting when she was eleven. Carrie Goldberg, an attorney who

480
00:26:43,440 --> 00:26:47,480
Speaker 1: specializes in crimes involving tech facilitated abuse, who we've interviewed

481
00:26:47,480 --> 00:26:49,960
Speaker 1: on the podcast before about section two thirty, we'll throw

482
00:26:50,000 --> 00:26:52,600
Speaker 1: her episode in the show description. Was the attorney on

483
00:26:52,640 --> 00:26:56,160
Speaker 1: the case. She told Wired, the permanent shutdown of omgle

484
00:26:56,280 --> 00:26:59,199
Speaker 1: was a term negotiated between Omegle and our client in

485
00:26:59,240 --> 00:27:02,840
Speaker 1: exchange for Omas getting to avoid the impending jury trial verdict.

486
00:27:03,080 --> 00:27:07,040
Speaker 1: So I thought of omgole as like technology that was

487
00:27:07,119 --> 00:27:09,639
Speaker 1: kind of of an era. It started back in two

488
00:27:09,680 --> 00:27:12,680
Speaker 1: thousand and nine, kind of fell off until the pandemic

489
00:27:12,680 --> 00:27:15,720
Speaker 1: when it gave people isolating in their homes another way

490
00:27:15,760 --> 00:27:18,800
Speaker 1: to use technology to connect with strangers and stave off loneliness.

491
00:27:19,240 --> 00:27:22,000
Speaker 1: You would enter omagle and instantly be matched with a

492
00:27:22,080 --> 00:27:25,480
Speaker 1: random person. You could click to be instantly rematched with

493
00:27:25,560 --> 00:27:27,679
Speaker 1: somebody new, so as you could leave that conversation if

494
00:27:27,720 --> 00:27:29,960
Speaker 1: you weren't feeling it and be connected with somebody else,

495
00:27:30,119 --> 00:27:31,760
Speaker 1: but you could not go back to who you were

496
00:27:31,760 --> 00:27:36,040
Speaker 1: just chatting with. So because of this instantaneous nature of omagel,

497
00:27:36,520 --> 00:27:40,600
Speaker 1: you really could like sign on and find yourself looking

498
00:27:40,680 --> 00:27:43,160
Speaker 1: at a stranger's genitals like instantly.

499
00:27:43,640 --> 00:27:47,240
Speaker 3: Yeah. Right, that's always the risk of the Internet.

500
00:27:47,560 --> 00:27:50,160
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean I was when I saw this headline.

501
00:27:50,160 --> 00:27:52,919
Speaker 1: I was like, oh yeah, omegol and I remember like

502
00:27:53,080 --> 00:27:55,560
Speaker 1: playing with it a few times, and it kind of

503
00:27:55,840 --> 00:28:01,439
Speaker 1: is like a cultural relic to a time where you know,

504
00:28:01,520 --> 00:28:05,440
Speaker 1: maybe we didn't even realize how unusual it should be

505
00:28:06,119 --> 00:28:09,840
Speaker 1: to be seeing a stranger doing something sexual online, whether

506
00:28:09,880 --> 00:28:11,880
Speaker 1: we wanted to or not. Like when I first started

507
00:28:11,920 --> 00:28:14,200
Speaker 1: reading about OMEKL shutting down, I was like, oh, yeah,

508
00:28:14,760 --> 00:28:17,320
Speaker 1: me and my friend saw so many men masturbating on

509
00:28:17,359 --> 00:28:20,760
Speaker 1: that platform. And I almost caught myself like recalling this

510
00:28:21,480 --> 00:28:23,919
Speaker 1: almost a bit fondly, until I was like, wait a minute,

511
00:28:24,000 --> 00:28:26,480
Speaker 1: what like that actually wasn't okay? Like I think it

512
00:28:26,560 --> 00:28:30,920
Speaker 1: is a relic of a time before. Maybe I'm always

513
00:28:30,920 --> 00:28:35,800
Speaker 1: speaking for myself, but before it was clear how not

514
00:28:36,000 --> 00:28:39,520
Speaker 1: okay that was, and how harmful that could be to people,

515
00:28:39,560 --> 00:28:42,800
Speaker 1: and how risky that was, like you know, And it's

516
00:28:42,840 --> 00:28:47,080
Speaker 1: funny because on Twitter, the conversation was very much like

517
00:28:47,520 --> 00:28:50,280
Speaker 1: people remembering the same thing. Like I saw somebody be like, oh,

518
00:28:50,280 --> 00:28:52,440
Speaker 1: shout out to all the thirty five year olds who

519
00:28:52,520 --> 00:28:55,960
Speaker 1: like showed me their genitals when I was fourteen. I

520
00:28:55,960 --> 00:28:59,520
Speaker 1: think we were all sort of thinking of this as

521
00:28:59,600 --> 00:29:04,360
Speaker 1: a rite a passage on the internet and using technology

522
00:29:04,480 --> 00:29:06,560
Speaker 1: and looking back, it's like, well, should we have been?

523
00:29:06,640 --> 00:29:08,160
Speaker 1: Should that have been and write a passage?

524
00:29:08,280 --> 00:29:12,720
Speaker 3: Yeah, It's almost like that was simpler time back when

525
00:29:12,960 --> 00:29:16,959
Speaker 3: the idea of being randomly connected with a stranger on

526
00:29:17,000 --> 00:29:21,160
Speaker 3: the Internet with video seemed like something that someone would want.

527
00:29:21,640 --> 00:29:24,000
Speaker 1: Yeah, so hold that thought, because that's going to be

528
00:29:24,000 --> 00:29:28,880
Speaker 1: relevant and distimont so as y'all might have gleaned by now,

529
00:29:29,280 --> 00:29:33,920
Speaker 1: omagle was a place where sex just really ran rampant

530
00:29:33,920 --> 00:29:36,800
Speaker 1: like that was definitely my experience playing with Omagle. In

531
00:29:36,840 --> 00:29:40,360
Speaker 1: a piece for Mashable, someone using the pseudonym Hannah called

532
00:29:40,400 --> 00:29:43,440
Speaker 1: it quote a digital glory hole, and that is my

533
00:29:43,640 --> 00:29:46,800
Speaker 1: recollection of it as well. Some of that sexuality on

534
00:29:46,840 --> 00:29:49,920
Speaker 1: omagle was consensual, but a lot of it was not,

535
00:29:50,440 --> 00:29:52,680
Speaker 1: you know, not all of the explicit stuff happening there

536
00:29:52,800 --> 00:29:56,800
Speaker 1: was consensual. Abusers could, and it sounds like did, have

537
00:29:56,920 --> 00:29:59,520
Speaker 1: a field day with that platform. In twenty twenty two,

538
00:29:59,600 --> 00:30:01,840
Speaker 1: there was one hundred and eight thousand, six hundred and

539
00:30:01,880 --> 00:30:05,240
Speaker 1: one reports of child exploitation in Omegle. To the nonprofit

540
00:30:05,280 --> 00:30:09,000
Speaker 1: the National Center for Michigan exploited children. Of all of

541
00:30:09,040 --> 00:30:12,520
Speaker 1: the sites the center tracks, only Facebook, Google and thram

542
00:30:12,560 --> 00:30:17,080
Speaker 1: and What's App ranked higher. Now platforms are generally protected

543
00:30:17,120 --> 00:30:20,120
Speaker 1: by Section two thirty of the Communications Decency Act, which

544
00:30:20,160 --> 00:30:22,520
Speaker 1: means that they cannot be held liable for what happens

545
00:30:22,560 --> 00:30:25,360
Speaker 1: on their platforms, but the judge in this case found

546
00:30:25,360 --> 00:30:27,760
Speaker 1: that omagle was at fault because the site's design is

547
00:30:27,760 --> 00:30:31,000
Speaker 1: what allowed for miners to be sexually targeted, and thus

548
00:30:31,280 --> 00:30:34,800
Speaker 1: omagle was not protected by Section two thirty. According to

549
00:30:34,840 --> 00:30:39,000
Speaker 1: the BBC, Omagle had almost no moderation. The entire company

550
00:30:39,040 --> 00:30:42,600
Speaker 1: was seemingly run solely by the founder, Leif Kbrooks, with

551
00:30:42,720 --> 00:30:46,000
Speaker 1: no other registered employees. BBC said that it was operated

552
00:30:46,000 --> 00:30:49,040
Speaker 1: from his lakeside house in Florida when he was either

553
00:30:49,080 --> 00:30:52,840
Speaker 1: asleep or offline. No complaints were acted upon. If you

554
00:30:52,880 --> 00:30:56,000
Speaker 1: go to omagle dot com right now instead of the site,

555
00:30:56,080 --> 00:30:59,360
Speaker 1: what you will find is a long sort of goodbyepost

556
00:30:59,400 --> 00:31:02,040
Speaker 1: from the found or leave K Brooks, in which he

557
00:31:02,240 --> 00:31:05,440
Speaker 1: argues that shutting down the platform to him is kind

558
00:31:05,480 --> 00:31:08,080
Speaker 1: of the end of an era of freedom online. We'll

559
00:31:08,080 --> 00:31:09,640
Speaker 1: post the whole thing in the show notes, but here

560
00:31:09,640 --> 00:31:12,760
Speaker 1: are a few key snippets. He writes, I launched Omegle

561
00:31:12,800 --> 00:31:14,560
Speaker 1: when I was eighteen years old and still living with

562
00:31:14,600 --> 00:31:16,520
Speaker 1: my parents. It was meant to build on the things

563
00:31:16,520 --> 00:31:18,959
Speaker 1: I loved about the Internet while introducing a form of

564
00:31:19,000 --> 00:31:22,800
Speaker 1: social spotaneity that I felt didn't exist anywhere else. If

565
00:31:22,800 --> 00:31:25,800
Speaker 1: the Internet is a manifestation of the global village, o'magle

566
00:31:25,920 --> 00:31:27,560
Speaker 1: was meant to be a way of strolling down a

567
00:31:27,600 --> 00:31:30,520
Speaker 1: street in that village, striking up conversations with people that

568
00:31:30,560 --> 00:31:33,960
Speaker 1: you run into along the way. Unfortunately, there are low lights.

569
00:31:34,200 --> 00:31:36,920
Speaker 1: Virtually every tool can be used for good or for evil,

570
00:31:37,200 --> 00:31:39,480
Speaker 1: and that it's especially true of communication tools due to

571
00:31:39,520 --> 00:31:42,520
Speaker 1: their innate flexibility. The telephone can be used to wish

572
00:31:42,560 --> 00:31:45,200
Speaker 1: your grandmother happy birthday, but it can also be used

573
00:31:45,200 --> 00:31:47,120
Speaker 1: to call in a bomb threat. There can be no

574
00:31:47,280 --> 00:31:50,560
Speaker 1: honest accounting of omeagle without acknowledging that some people misused it,

575
00:31:50,800 --> 00:31:54,280
Speaker 1: including to commit unspeakably heinous crimes. To an extent, it

576
00:31:54,360 --> 00:31:56,920
Speaker 1: is reasonable to question the policies and practices of any

577
00:31:56,920 --> 00:31:59,520
Speaker 1: place where crime has occurred. I have always welcome to

578
00:31:59,520 --> 00:32:03,000
Speaker 1: constructive feedback, and indeed omagle implemented a number of improvements

579
00:32:03,040 --> 00:32:06,760
Speaker 1: based on such feedback over the years. Side note if

580
00:32:06,840 --> 00:32:09,200
Speaker 1: you believe that BBC article, it does not sound like

581
00:32:09,240 --> 00:32:12,560
Speaker 1: that was the case. However, the recent attacks have felt

582
00:32:12,600 --> 00:32:15,720
Speaker 1: anything but constructive. The only way to please these people

583
00:32:15,800 --> 00:32:18,240
Speaker 1: is to stop offering the service. Sometimes they say so

584
00:32:18,320 --> 00:32:21,280
Speaker 1: explicitly and avowedly it can be inferred from their act

585
00:32:21,320 --> 00:32:24,760
Speaker 1: of setting standards that are not humanly achievable. Either way,

586
00:32:24,800 --> 00:32:27,480
Speaker 1: the net result is the same. Omagel is the direct

587
00:32:27,520 --> 00:32:29,960
Speaker 1: target of these attacks, but their ultimate victim is you,

588
00:32:30,480 --> 00:32:32,240
Speaker 1: all of you out there who have used or would

589
00:32:32,320 --> 00:32:35,040
Speaker 1: use omagle to improve your lives and the lives of others.

590
00:32:35,320 --> 00:32:37,960
Speaker 1: When they say omagel shouldn't exist, they are really saying

591
00:32:38,000 --> 00:32:39,960
Speaker 1: that you shouldn't be allowed to use it, that you

592
00:32:39,960 --> 00:32:42,880
Speaker 1: shouldn't be allowed to meet random new people online. That

593
00:32:43,040 --> 00:32:46,080
Speaker 1: idea is anathema to the ideal's eyeshair, specifically to the

594
00:32:46,120 --> 00:32:49,680
Speaker 1: bedrock principle of a free society that when restrictions are

595
00:32:49,720 --> 00:32:53,000
Speaker 1: imposed to prevent crime, the burden of those restrictions must

596
00:32:53,040 --> 00:32:56,720
Speaker 1: not be targeted at innocent victims or potential victims of crime.

597
00:32:57,320 --> 00:32:59,600
Speaker 1: I've done my best to whether the attacks with the

598
00:32:59,600 --> 00:33:02,520
Speaker 1: interest of Omegle's users and the broader principle. In my mind,

599
00:33:02,800 --> 00:33:05,880
Speaker 1: if something as simple as meeting random new people is forbidden,

600
00:33:05,880 --> 00:33:08,959
Speaker 1: what's next That is far and away removed from anything

601
00:33:08,960 --> 00:33:11,400
Speaker 1: that can be considered a reasonable compromise of the principle

602
00:33:11,400 --> 00:33:14,160
Speaker 1: I outlined. Analogies are a limited tool but a physical

603
00:33:14,160 --> 00:33:17,200
Speaker 1: world analogy might be shutting down Central Park because crime

604
00:33:17,200 --> 00:33:21,360
Speaker 1: occurs there, or perhaps more provocatively, destroying a universe because

605
00:33:21,440 --> 00:33:25,080
Speaker 1: it contains evil. A healthy, free society cannot endure when

606
00:33:25,080 --> 00:33:28,000
Speaker 1: we are collectively afraid of each other to this extent.

607
00:33:28,920 --> 00:33:31,080
Speaker 1: So there's a lot more to it that I'm only

608
00:33:31,120 --> 00:33:35,240
Speaker 1: reading snippets. But it's complicated because in some ways I

609
00:33:35,280 --> 00:33:38,760
Speaker 1: agree with him, right, Like, I do think that there

610
00:33:38,840 --> 00:33:44,120
Speaker 1: is an era of freedom and promise coming to a

611
00:33:44,200 --> 00:33:46,600
Speaker 1: close kind of what you were alluding to earlier, Mike,

612
00:33:46,640 --> 00:33:50,520
Speaker 1: that like the era where we might have thought it

613
00:33:50,720 --> 00:33:54,880
Speaker 1: was a pure net good to be randomly connected to

614
00:33:55,040 --> 00:33:58,240
Speaker 1: random strangers from the comfort of our own home anonymously.

615
00:33:58,760 --> 00:34:02,200
Speaker 1: And I I kind of in some ways I kind

616
00:34:02,240 --> 00:34:05,640
Speaker 1: of see what he's getting at. But if that promise

617
00:34:05,840 --> 00:34:10,040
Speaker 1: means just accepting and tolerating the harm of miners, it

618
00:34:10,120 --> 00:34:12,000
Speaker 1: is not a promise worth keeping. Like I think that

619
00:34:12,000 --> 00:34:16,120
Speaker 1: that's what he's missing, that if this platform that you've built,

620
00:34:16,120 --> 00:34:19,719
Speaker 1: that you've imagined us this like great utopia, comes at

621
00:34:19,760 --> 00:34:23,120
Speaker 1: the cost of the safety and wellbeing of kids, then

622
00:34:23,200 --> 00:34:25,360
Speaker 1: it is not a utopia. That's not just something that

623
00:34:25,400 --> 00:34:28,799
Speaker 1: we should just like laugh off or normalize as a

624
00:34:28,960 --> 00:34:33,160
Speaker 1: right of passage for understanding how to have experiences online.

625
00:34:33,280 --> 00:34:36,600
Speaker 1: It's not okay. And it sounds like that freedom that

626
00:34:36,640 --> 00:34:40,400
Speaker 1: he's pointing to the cost of that freedom is harm

627
00:34:40,520 --> 00:34:43,239
Speaker 1: at miners. And I don't think that is a cost

628
00:34:43,280 --> 00:34:46,480
Speaker 1: that we are okay with. Maybe we hadn't realized what

629
00:34:46,560 --> 00:34:49,440
Speaker 1: that truly cost us before and he's he yearns for

630
00:34:49,480 --> 00:34:53,239
Speaker 1: that time, and I understand, but now we have a

631
00:34:53,360 --> 00:34:57,840
Speaker 1: better understanding of the true cost of this like principled

632
00:34:58,040 --> 00:35:00,800
Speaker 1: utopian internet that he's laying out. What do you think.

633
00:35:01,239 --> 00:35:06,360
Speaker 3: I think the freedom that he's describing and you know,

634
00:35:06,480 --> 00:35:09,400
Speaker 3: lamenting the loss of here is the freedom of a

635
00:35:09,520 --> 00:35:16,200
Speaker 3: child who has no sense of the responsibility that comes

636
00:35:16,239 --> 00:35:21,560
Speaker 3: with freedom. And I also think that he uses a

637
00:35:21,560 --> 00:35:27,400
Speaker 3: lot of analogies to try to justify why it's okay

638
00:35:28,160 --> 00:35:33,600
Speaker 3: for him to have built this platform that led to

639
00:35:33,680 --> 00:35:40,360
Speaker 3: this child being sexually abused. You know, he made the

640
00:35:40,400 --> 00:35:43,160
Speaker 3: analogy of a telephone. He's like, oh, you could use

641
00:35:43,160 --> 00:35:46,720
Speaker 3: a telephone to call in a bomb threat. That's true,

642
00:35:47,560 --> 00:35:55,839
Speaker 3: but the Internet fundamentally changes the scalability of harm, right, Like,

643
00:35:56,400 --> 00:35:58,799
Speaker 3: one of the cool things about the Internet is that

644
00:35:59,120 --> 00:36:03,000
Speaker 3: some eighteen year old guy can build an app or

645
00:36:03,040 --> 00:36:07,799
Speaker 3: a web app or whatever it was, and you know,

646
00:36:08,320 --> 00:36:10,600
Speaker 3: doesn't cost him a lot of money, doesn't cost him

647
00:36:10,600 --> 00:36:14,480
Speaker 3: a lot of like server capacity to run, just serve

648
00:36:14,520 --> 00:36:17,759
Speaker 3: it out of his garage and make it available to

649
00:36:18,600 --> 00:36:20,880
Speaker 3: hundreds of thousands of people all over the world. That

650
00:36:21,040 --> 00:36:26,759
Speaker 3: is super powerful and really cool. But it's also really dangerous, right,

651
00:36:26,800 --> 00:36:30,960
Speaker 3: and he alludes to that, and there has to be

652
00:36:31,120 --> 00:36:36,560
Speaker 3: some kind of responsibility when you build something that is

653
00:36:36,640 --> 00:36:42,319
Speaker 3: affecting so many people, it changes the math. Right, Like,

654
00:36:42,400 --> 00:36:46,240
Speaker 3: if if he built this tool and like a dozen

655
00:36:46,280 --> 00:36:50,319
Speaker 3: of his friends were using it and one person got

656
00:36:50,360 --> 00:36:53,880
Speaker 3: unintentionally harmed, that's not great and he should probably think

657
00:36:53,920 --> 00:36:59,040
Speaker 3: about that. But that's different than you know, hundreds of

658
00:36:59,040 --> 00:37:02,719
Speaker 3: thousands of people around the world using it. There's a

659
00:37:02,800 --> 00:37:09,760
Speaker 3: responsibility there that is just nowhere in this lengthy letter

660
00:37:09,880 --> 00:37:10,520
Speaker 3: that you read.

661
00:37:11,120 --> 00:37:14,440
Speaker 1: Yeah, that is something that is really downplayed in his

662
00:37:15,000 --> 00:37:20,359
Speaker 1: like long thing is the ways that he just abdicated

663
00:37:20,440 --> 00:37:24,400
Speaker 1: responsibility to keeping users safe. In the ruling, you know,

664
00:37:24,800 --> 00:37:26,839
Speaker 1: one of the reasons why the judge said that he

665
00:37:27,239 --> 00:37:29,560
Speaker 1: was not that the sub section two thirty did not

666
00:37:29,600 --> 00:37:34,560
Speaker 1: apply is because the judge said he could have put

667
00:37:34,640 --> 00:37:39,080
Speaker 1: some some safeguards in place so that adult abusers were

668
00:37:39,080 --> 00:37:41,400
Speaker 1: not being connected to kids like that, Like the judge

669
00:37:41,400 --> 00:37:46,280
Speaker 1: described how because of the like you know, functionality of Omegel,

670
00:37:46,280 --> 00:37:49,920
Speaker 1: where you can just hit next until you get what

671
00:37:50,000 --> 00:37:55,240
Speaker 1: you want, abusers essentially are just like shopping for people

672
00:37:55,280 --> 00:37:57,600
Speaker 1: to abuse, and they can just be like, not what

673
00:37:57,680 --> 00:37:59,319
Speaker 1: I'm looking for, not what I'm looking for, not what

674
00:37:59,360 --> 00:38:01,640
Speaker 1: I'm looking for, and when I'm looking for, And so

675
00:38:01,719 --> 00:38:05,239
Speaker 1: there's there just seems to be a lot of downplaying

676
00:38:05,320 --> 00:38:09,239
Speaker 1: of his own responsibility in why this platform had to

677
00:38:09,280 --> 00:38:09,840
Speaker 1: shut down.

678
00:38:10,440 --> 00:38:13,719
Speaker 3: There's no acknowledgment that responsibility even exists.

679
00:38:14,239 --> 00:38:16,839
Speaker 1: But I think that when he talks about the when

680
00:38:16,880 --> 00:38:19,680
Speaker 1: he's like, oh, I'm I'm I yearn for a different time,

681
00:38:20,080 --> 00:38:22,160
Speaker 1: I think that what he is actually talking about is

682
00:38:22,200 --> 00:38:26,240
Speaker 1: a time before we really understood what was at stake

683
00:38:26,360 --> 00:38:29,280
Speaker 1: and the harm that could be caused. And it's almost

684
00:38:29,280 --> 00:38:31,560
Speaker 1: like a kind of like good old days when people

685
00:38:31,680 --> 00:38:37,000
Speaker 1: when people thought that non consensual images of genitalia being

686
00:38:37,040 --> 00:38:39,640
Speaker 1: shown to a child wasn't a big deal. Like I

687
00:38:39,880 --> 00:38:42,200
Speaker 1: think that he's like, I think that he's thinking about

688
00:38:42,200 --> 00:38:43,759
Speaker 1: it a completely different way than we are.

689
00:38:44,680 --> 00:38:47,040
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think you're right. I think he's yearning for

690
00:38:48,880 --> 00:38:51,520
Speaker 3: the good old days, which were a time of ignorance

691
00:38:51,960 --> 00:38:54,560
Speaker 3: before we had thought about any of this stuff.

692
00:38:54,480 --> 00:38:57,279
Speaker 1: And before we knew I think I think that, you know,

693
00:38:58,560 --> 00:39:01,279
Speaker 1: it seems like this technology is been around for so long,

694
00:39:01,360 --> 00:39:04,759
Speaker 1: but it really hasn't and we're only now starting to

695
00:39:04,840 --> 00:39:08,440
Speaker 1: like truly grapple with the impact, I think in a

696
00:39:08,480 --> 00:39:11,080
Speaker 1: real way, because it hasn't really been that long. And

697
00:39:11,200 --> 00:39:13,360
Speaker 1: I think that he what he's saying is like, remember

698
00:39:13,440 --> 00:39:17,360
Speaker 1: back before we understood the impact and like nobody cared

699
00:39:17,480 --> 00:39:19,600
Speaker 1: and it was like better. I'm not so sure that

700
00:39:19,680 --> 00:39:22,480
Speaker 1: it was better. I think that the plaintiff in this

701
00:39:22,680 --> 00:39:26,399
Speaker 1: place would probably agree that it wasn't better. And so, yeah,

702
00:39:26,480 --> 00:39:30,760
Speaker 1: I A lot of people are trading his goodbye letter

703
00:39:31,040 --> 00:39:34,279
Speaker 1: around the internet as if it's a treatise on a

704
00:39:35,120 --> 00:39:38,360
Speaker 1: better time, and I'm just I really would caution against that.

705
00:39:38,480 --> 00:39:45,520
Speaker 1: I think that it is really fundamentally normalizing a time

706
00:39:46,200 --> 00:39:48,760
Speaker 1: that really maybe wasn't so great for a lot of people.

707
00:39:49,600 --> 00:39:54,279
Speaker 3: Yeah, I feel you. It's it just reminds me of

708
00:39:54,320 --> 00:39:58,359
Speaker 3: like a sixteen year old reading Voltaire a little bit. Yes, yeah,

709
00:39:58,520 --> 00:40:01,840
Speaker 3: like sixteen year old should read volt Tear and that's great.

710
00:40:01,920 --> 00:40:06,400
Speaker 3: But and this particular example is kind of a tricky

711
00:40:06,400 --> 00:40:09,399
Speaker 3: one because it sounds like maybe he wasn't monetizing this.

712
00:40:10,040 --> 00:40:12,680
Speaker 3: Maybe he does. He was truly making it because he

713
00:40:13,360 --> 00:40:16,360
Speaker 3: thought it was fun, and you know, I respect that,

714
00:40:16,400 --> 00:40:18,640
Speaker 3: and I can see how it would be really sad

715
00:40:18,800 --> 00:40:21,160
Speaker 3: for him to have to shut it down, especially in

716
00:40:21,160 --> 00:40:26,560
Speaker 3: this Oh oh okay, they made money, I didn't know

717
00:40:26,800 --> 00:40:30,799
Speaker 3: profiting off of it. Yeah, So that's also relevant and

718
00:40:31,000 --> 00:40:33,440
Speaker 3: does not show up anywhere in his statement right that

719
00:40:33,480 --> 00:40:38,000
Speaker 3: he's profiting on this. It's not like he's trying to

720
00:40:38,080 --> 00:40:43,279
Speaker 3: foster human connection and serendipity to achieve greater understanding in

721
00:40:43,320 --> 00:40:46,080
Speaker 3: an altruistic way. He's trying to make money off this,

722
00:40:46,480 --> 00:40:53,279
Speaker 3: And that also changes the math on the responsibility one

723
00:40:53,440 --> 00:40:57,880
Speaker 3: has to keep people safe when you're charging the money

724
00:40:57,920 --> 00:40:59,120
Speaker 3: for what you're selling them.

725
00:40:59,719 --> 00:41:02,759
Speaker 1: Yeah, but yet he gets to just talk about this

726
00:41:03,000 --> 00:41:05,760
Speaker 1: like I just created this as a force for good

727
00:41:05,840 --> 00:41:07,719
Speaker 1: in the world and to see what I wanted to

728
00:41:07,760 --> 00:41:09,759
Speaker 1: see in the world. Like yeah, but also, you were

729
00:41:09,800 --> 00:41:14,239
Speaker 1: making money from advertising, so like like like you can

730
00:41:14,560 --> 00:41:18,320
Speaker 1: you you can write all the like high pollutant, poetic

731
00:41:18,440 --> 00:41:20,520
Speaker 1: things that you want, but like, let's keep let's like

732
00:41:20,880 --> 00:41:23,319
Speaker 1: not forget that and you have you then have a

733
00:41:23,360 --> 00:41:27,000
Speaker 1: responsibility to not profit from the harm of young people

734
00:41:27,400 --> 00:41:29,080
Speaker 1: when you are making money from a platform.

735
00:41:29,719 --> 00:41:32,000
Speaker 3: Yeah, and there was another path he could have taken, right,

736
00:41:32,040 --> 00:41:35,480
Speaker 3: He could have gotten some moderation going. He could have

737
00:41:37,120 --> 00:41:42,399
Speaker 3: built some kind of functionality too to allow blocking or

738
00:41:43,120 --> 00:41:46,480
Speaker 3: any number of things other than just like pack it

739
00:41:46,560 --> 00:41:51,120
Speaker 3: up and go home and complain, because uh, you know,

740
00:41:51,160 --> 00:41:55,320
Speaker 3: he can't just do whatever he wants at any cost.

741
00:41:56,040 --> 00:41:59,160
Speaker 1: Well, speaking of packing it up and going home, a

742
00:41:59,160 --> 00:42:01,279
Speaker 1: website that I wish she was not packing it up

743
00:42:01,280 --> 00:42:04,120
Speaker 1: and going home, we have to give a major shout

744
00:42:04,160 --> 00:42:07,960
Speaker 1: out to, and that is jezz Bell because Jezbel's parent company,

745
00:42:08,080 --> 00:42:12,520
Speaker 1: go Media announced today the website is shutting down effective immediately.

746
00:42:13,160 --> 00:42:13,879
Speaker 3: Boo.

747
00:42:14,440 --> 00:42:18,040
Speaker 1: I know I was a big reader of jezz bell It.

748
00:42:19,120 --> 00:42:20,880
Speaker 1: I don't think i'd be the person I am today

749
00:42:20,920 --> 00:42:23,359
Speaker 1: if not for jezz bell. It has been around since

750
00:42:23,360 --> 00:42:25,280
Speaker 1: two thousand and seven, when it was founded by Anna

751
00:42:25,320 --> 00:42:30,200
Speaker 1: Holmes to sort of be the like feminist alternative, although

752
00:42:30,200 --> 00:42:32,320
Speaker 1: they did they intentionally did not use the word feminist

753
00:42:32,360 --> 00:42:34,759
Speaker 1: when they were pitching it, but the feminist alternative to

754
00:42:34,960 --> 00:42:39,160
Speaker 1: glossy airbrushed women's magazines like Glamour. Side note, I once

755
00:42:39,239 --> 00:42:41,279
Speaker 1: met Anna Holmes at a party and she is a

756
00:42:41,320 --> 00:42:45,680
Speaker 1: total fucking baller. Shout out to her. She is incredible.

757
00:42:46,440 --> 00:42:49,480
Speaker 1: So the website was really something special in media, particularly

758
00:42:49,520 --> 00:42:52,080
Speaker 1: in women's media. It came about at a time where

759
00:42:52,120 --> 00:42:55,480
Speaker 1: the dominant understanding of like what women wanted from media

760
00:42:55,680 --> 00:43:00,360
Speaker 1: was like polish and airbrushing and quizzes. On Jezebel's foray,

761
00:43:00,440 --> 00:43:03,359
Speaker 1: they offered a ten thousand dollars bounty to anybody who

762
00:43:03,440 --> 00:43:06,600
Speaker 1: sent in pre airbrush photos of a model that eventually

763
00:43:06,600 --> 00:43:09,719
Speaker 1: became a glossy magazine cover photo. The winner was a

764
00:43:09,719 --> 00:43:13,960
Speaker 1: photo of Faith Hill, unretouched for Red Book magazine. So

765
00:43:14,120 --> 00:43:16,319
Speaker 1: this might sound silly, but it's one of those things

766
00:43:16,360 --> 00:43:18,359
Speaker 1: that if you weren't there, if you didn't like, live

767
00:43:18,400 --> 00:43:22,280
Speaker 1: through it. It is really hard to overstate the impact

768
00:43:22,280 --> 00:43:25,120
Speaker 1: that Jezbell had on media culture and the way that

769
00:43:25,200 --> 00:43:29,000
Speaker 1: content on the Internet exists, especially content for women, but

770
00:43:29,080 --> 00:43:31,680
Speaker 1: content more broadly as well. Jezebel came up around the

771
00:43:31,680 --> 00:43:34,600
Speaker 1: same time as Twitter, and in many ways, the Jezbel

772
00:43:34,719 --> 00:43:37,560
Speaker 1: comment section was like the prototype for what Twitter would

773
00:43:37,560 --> 00:43:43,080
Speaker 1: eventually become. Like their comment section was Oh God, like

774
00:43:44,680 --> 00:43:46,080
Speaker 1: I used to spend a lot of time in their

775
00:43:46,120 --> 00:43:51,040
Speaker 1: comment section. Jessbel was started as a spinoff to Gawker Media,

776
00:43:51,239 --> 00:43:54,880
Speaker 1: but eventually surpassed its parent site Gawker in popularity and

777
00:43:54,960 --> 00:43:57,560
Speaker 1: page views. In two thousand and eight, the Autawa Citizen

778
00:43:57,640 --> 00:44:00,720
Speaker 1: had found that community based women's websites were with political

779
00:44:00,760 --> 00:44:04,040
Speaker 1: sites as the Internet's fastest growing category, while also citing

780
00:44:04,080 --> 00:44:07,640
Speaker 1: ad Ages research showing that women's Internet use was outpacing

781
00:44:07,680 --> 00:44:11,160
Speaker 1: men's at that time. So Jessbel was really foundational to

782
00:44:11,200 --> 00:44:15,239
Speaker 1: this era that really was like women are online, women

783
00:44:15,320 --> 00:44:17,239
Speaker 1: are seeking content on the Internet, and we got to

784
00:44:17,280 --> 00:44:21,960
Speaker 1: give women readers and audiences something they actually want. We

785
00:44:22,120 --> 00:44:25,560
Speaker 1: absolutely would not have an entire generation of women's focused

786
00:44:25,560 --> 00:44:28,000
Speaker 1: media if not for Jezbell. Sites that you know and

787
00:44:28,080 --> 00:44:31,879
Speaker 1: love like Reductriss Exo, Jane, the Frisky, the Hairpin would

788
00:44:31,960 --> 00:44:34,800
Speaker 1: not exist if not for Jessbell. You know, there really

789
00:44:34,920 --> 00:44:38,760
Speaker 1: wasn't a place for this like voicy, zeitgeisty, snarky writing

790
00:44:38,760 --> 00:44:42,160
Speaker 1: for women that also was like feminist and intersectional and

791
00:44:42,200 --> 00:44:45,160
Speaker 1: explicitly political. Like hell, I don't even know if I'd

792
00:44:45,160 --> 00:44:48,200
Speaker 1: been making this podcast right now if not for Jezzbell.

793
00:44:48,640 --> 00:44:51,000
Speaker 1: I was a voracious reader of Jezbel. One of the

794
00:44:51,040 --> 00:44:55,279
Speaker 1: first like serious pieces quote unquote that I ever got

795
00:44:55,320 --> 00:44:58,400
Speaker 1: published was about being black in the Occupy Wall Street movement.

796
00:44:59,200 --> 00:45:02,239
Speaker 1: Was for Jetzbel, though Mike my first big byeline, and

797
00:45:02,280 --> 00:45:04,840
Speaker 1: I think that's probably true for like an entire generation

798
00:45:04,960 --> 00:45:09,759
Speaker 1: of media folks. Jessbell's parent company, GoMedia, which publishes Gizmoto

799
00:45:09,840 --> 00:45:12,520
Speaker 1: and The Onion, recently was in some hot water for

800
00:45:12,560 --> 00:45:16,200
Speaker 1: publishing a slew of AI generated pieces without input from

801
00:45:16,280 --> 00:45:19,279
Speaker 1: human editors that contained lots of errors and just like

802
00:45:19,480 --> 00:45:22,359
Speaker 1: flat out false information and ultimately we're just not good

803
00:45:22,800 --> 00:45:26,279
Speaker 1: after this, they actually stuck by that choice publicly and

804
00:45:26,320 --> 00:45:30,120
Speaker 1: said that they were going to keep publishing AI generated articles,

805
00:45:30,200 --> 00:45:32,640
Speaker 1: saying it is absolutely a thing we want to do

806
00:45:32,680 --> 00:45:36,479
Speaker 1: more of. That's from Meryl Brown, geo's editorial director. What's

807
00:45:36,560 --> 00:45:39,200
Speaker 1: worse is that, according to Daily Beast, it sounds like

808
00:45:39,320 --> 00:45:41,680
Speaker 1: the layoffs were just like not handled in a great way.

809
00:45:41,920 --> 00:45:44,399
Speaker 1: There was us meeting where staff was assured there would

810
00:45:44,440 --> 00:45:47,040
Speaker 1: not be layoffs, only to later tell everybody that they

811
00:45:47,040 --> 00:45:50,480
Speaker 1: would all be losing their jobs effective immediately shortly thereafter.

812
00:45:50,920 --> 00:45:54,120
Speaker 1: It sounds like the laidoff staffers squarely place the blame

813
00:45:54,200 --> 00:45:58,000
Speaker 1: on senior leadership. We are devastated, though hardly surprised at

814
00:45:58,040 --> 00:46:01,839
Speaker 1: Geomedia and Jim Spanfuller's ability to run our website and

815
00:46:01,880 --> 00:46:04,960
Speaker 1: the cruel decision to shutter it. That's from the Writer's

816
00:46:05,000 --> 00:46:08,080
Speaker 1: Guild of America East, which represents Geo Media staffers, adding

817
00:46:08,080 --> 00:46:11,000
Speaker 1: in their statement quote, a well run company would have

818
00:46:11,000 --> 00:46:13,799
Speaker 1: moved away from an advertising model, but instead they are

819
00:46:13,840 --> 00:46:18,360
Speaker 1: shuttering the brand entirely because of their strategic and commercial ineptitude.

820
00:46:18,680 --> 00:46:22,440
Speaker 1: Liz Lenz, who's been on the podcast before, tweeted Jezbel

821
00:46:22,560 --> 00:46:24,880
Speaker 1: was a place where women could unabashedly write about culture,

822
00:46:25,000 --> 00:46:27,799
Speaker 1: politics and everything with voice and humor and a whole

823
00:46:27,880 --> 00:46:30,279
Speaker 1: range of human emotions. The fact that it was killed

824
00:46:30,280 --> 00:46:34,680
Speaker 1: by anept men is truly a metaphor. So what's really

825
00:46:34,840 --> 00:46:37,799
Speaker 1: resonating with me about how important this specific kind of

826
00:46:37,800 --> 00:46:40,920
Speaker 1: work that Jessbell produced is at this moment is that,

827
00:46:41,280 --> 00:46:44,680
Speaker 1: in addition to a lot of their like snarky, gossipy content,

828
00:46:45,160 --> 00:46:48,000
Speaker 1: their reporters also publish some of the most in depth

829
00:46:48,040 --> 00:46:51,560
Speaker 1: reported pieces on issues that impact women, from the elections

830
00:46:51,560 --> 00:46:54,759
Speaker 1: in Virginia and Ohio to the Republican debate this last night,

831
00:46:55,200 --> 00:46:58,160
Speaker 1: it could not be clear how important of a topic

832
00:46:58,239 --> 00:47:01,200
Speaker 1: abortion is. Right now, there are just not a ton

833
00:47:01,239 --> 00:47:04,920
Speaker 1: of places with really good, in depth reported pieces on

834
00:47:05,040 --> 00:47:09,399
Speaker 1: the huge intersections of technology and abortion. For instance, Jess

835
00:47:09,440 --> 00:47:12,040
Speaker 1: Bell was doing that work, but now there is one

836
00:47:12,200 --> 00:47:15,360
Speaker 1: less place for it. A lot of folks were understandably

837
00:47:15,400 --> 00:47:18,359
Speaker 1: wondering how a popular, well liked website like jez Bell

838
00:47:18,760 --> 00:47:20,520
Speaker 1: just could not find a way to make it work

839
00:47:20,560 --> 00:47:22,640
Speaker 1: and had to shut down. A piece in four h

840
00:47:22,760 --> 00:47:26,360
Speaker 1: four Media written by Jason Kobler and Emmanuel Mayberg sheds

841
00:47:26,360 --> 00:47:28,800
Speaker 1: a little bit of light into that. They actually suggest

842
00:47:28,840 --> 00:47:31,799
Speaker 1: that jez Bell's in depth reporting about important topics and

843
00:47:31,840 --> 00:47:34,120
Speaker 1: I was just describing might have actually been one of

844
00:47:34,120 --> 00:47:37,640
Speaker 1: the reasons that led to jezz Bell closing. As I said,

845
00:47:37,800 --> 00:47:41,959
Speaker 1: Jessbell did not shy away from tackling tough topics, things

846
00:47:42,000 --> 00:47:44,480
Speaker 1: that we all need to know about, which understandably are

847
00:47:44,520 --> 00:47:48,280
Speaker 1: sometimes heavy or complex. But because of the advertising model,

848
00:47:48,480 --> 00:47:52,520
Speaker 1: brands were sometimes wary about their ads showing next to

849
00:47:52,760 --> 00:47:58,360
Speaker 1: any content that might have been controversial. In quotes, Lauren Tosionnan,

850
00:47:58,600 --> 00:48:02,400
Speaker 1: Jezbell's interim editor, and told four four Media that Jessbell

851
00:48:02,560 --> 00:48:05,319
Speaker 1: was told that brand safety, you know, the fact that

852
00:48:05,360 --> 00:48:07,400
Speaker 1: advertisers don't want to be next to the kind of

853
00:48:07,440 --> 00:48:10,040
Speaker 1: content that Jess Bell was publishing was one of the

854
00:48:10,040 --> 00:48:13,080
Speaker 1: biggest factors that led to GEO to stop publishing the

855
00:48:13,120 --> 00:48:15,400
Speaker 1: site and to lay off the whole staff. She adds

856
00:48:15,400 --> 00:48:17,520
Speaker 1: in a couple of weeks ago, the ad sales team

857
00:48:17,600 --> 00:48:20,640
Speaker 1: even asked if the website could remove Jess Bell's tagline

858
00:48:20,960 --> 00:48:25,560
Speaker 1: sex Celebrity, politics with Teeth from the site. She says

859
00:48:25,760 --> 00:48:27,600
Speaker 1: they took it off because they're like, let's see if

860
00:48:27,640 --> 00:48:30,000
Speaker 1: this makes a huge difference. So yeah, it was very

861
00:48:30,080 --> 00:48:32,239
Speaker 1: much the problem here that no one would advertise on

862
00:48:32,320 --> 00:48:35,319
Speaker 1: jez Bell because we cover sex and abortion. I know

863
00:48:35,400 --> 00:48:37,600
Speaker 1: that taking the tagline off was to see if the

864
00:48:37,640 --> 00:48:40,640
Speaker 1: algorithm advertising would change and if it was removed. One

865
00:48:40,640 --> 00:48:42,960
Speaker 1: of the editorial directors was like, I'm seeing an ad

866
00:48:43,000 --> 00:48:45,080
Speaker 1: for j Crew for the first time ever. Maybe this

867
00:48:45,120 --> 00:48:47,760
Speaker 1: will be good, which led to the staff really wondering

868
00:48:48,040 --> 00:48:51,360
Speaker 1: whether or not sticking with that particular advertising model to

869
00:48:51,360 --> 00:48:54,360
Speaker 1: make money really made any sense at all. And I

870
00:48:54,360 --> 00:48:58,960
Speaker 1: think that it's closing to me, like really signals the

871
00:48:59,200 --> 00:49:02,759
Speaker 1: end of a certain kind of media climate and a

872
00:49:02,840 --> 00:49:06,440
Speaker 1: beginning of something that frankly doesn't feel that great, and

873
00:49:06,560 --> 00:49:09,320
Speaker 1: a really fascinating piece for The New Yorker. Anna Holmes,

874
00:49:09,719 --> 00:49:12,399
Speaker 1: Jezebel's founder, looked back on what she built at jez

875
00:49:12,400 --> 00:49:14,800
Speaker 1: Bell and the media legacy that it's leaving behind, writing

876
00:49:15,200 --> 00:49:17,279
Speaker 1: I see jezz Bell not as the beginning of the

877
00:49:17,400 --> 00:49:19,680
Speaker 1: end of the digital media era, but as a moment

878
00:49:19,880 --> 00:49:23,400
Speaker 1: a spark with an ongoing discussion about gender politics. That

879
00:49:23,520 --> 00:49:28,400
Speaker 1: conversation has led to new realities around sexual assault and harassment, pay, inequity,

880
00:49:28,719 --> 00:49:32,520
Speaker 1: and cultural depictions of women. It also makes some people uncomfortable,

881
00:49:32,520 --> 00:49:34,880
Speaker 1: in part because it involves women expressing their anger in

882
00:49:34,920 --> 00:49:38,520
Speaker 1: public and sustained ways. Every woman has a well stocked

883
00:49:38,600 --> 00:49:41,160
Speaker 1: arsenal of anger Audrey Lord Road in nineteen eighty one,

884
00:49:41,440 --> 00:49:44,440
Speaker 1: which can act as a powerful source of energy serving

885
00:49:44,480 --> 00:49:48,239
Speaker 1: progress in change. If that's part of Jezbel's legacy, I'll

886
00:49:48,280 --> 00:49:50,640
Speaker 1: take it. It's about everything I could have hoped for.

887
00:49:51,600 --> 00:49:52,840
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's a sad one.

888
00:49:53,080 --> 00:49:58,560
Speaker 1: Yeah, rest in peace, jezz Bell. Like what a good

889
00:49:58,600 --> 00:49:59,200
Speaker 1: fucking sight.

890
00:50:00,120 --> 00:50:05,440
Speaker 3: Yeah, and you you're right, like of an era, really

891
00:50:07,040 --> 00:50:11,400
Speaker 3: like it was a leading voice on the Internet. I

892
00:50:11,400 --> 00:50:14,720
Speaker 3: don't I don't know it was voice isn't the right word,

893
00:50:14,800 --> 00:50:18,719
Speaker 3: but uh, it was like an important outlet on the

894
00:50:18,719 --> 00:50:20,320
Speaker 3: Internet for years.

895
00:50:20,600 --> 00:50:22,800
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I also think it just like we wouldn't.

896
00:50:22,880 --> 00:50:25,480
Speaker 1: I don't think that content on the Internet would look

897
00:50:25,520 --> 00:50:28,920
Speaker 1: the same with that Without jezz beelt like it changed things,

898
00:50:30,360 --> 00:50:34,239
Speaker 1: Like it was famously satirized on thirty Rock. It was

899
00:50:34,320 --> 00:50:38,080
Speaker 1: like angrywomen dot com or something like that. Like when

900
00:50:38,200 --> 00:50:42,160
Speaker 1: like Liz says, Liz makes a joke on on TGS

901
00:50:42,200 --> 00:50:46,319
Speaker 1: and a Jezbel parody website is like flaming her for it. Yeah,

902
00:50:46,320 --> 00:50:48,960
Speaker 1: it just it just really caught. It was like lightning

903
00:50:48,960 --> 00:50:52,600
Speaker 1: in a bottle. It really caught something special. Obviously, kind

904
00:50:52,600 --> 00:50:54,399
Speaker 1: of going back to the conversation we were just happening.

905
00:50:54,440 --> 00:50:57,000
Speaker 1: It wasn't without its faults, like some if you were

906
00:50:57,000 --> 00:50:59,440
Speaker 1: around for those Jezbel days, you probably remember some of

907
00:50:59,480 --> 00:51:03,640
Speaker 1: the wild conversations that happened there and some of the

908
00:51:03,680 --> 00:51:05,759
Speaker 1: wild antics of some of the folks that worked there.

909
00:51:07,040 --> 00:51:08,759
Speaker 1: But yeah, it was it was of an era.

910
00:51:09,440 --> 00:51:13,720
Speaker 3: Yeah, there's there's a certain Internet snarkiness that I really

911
00:51:13,800 --> 00:51:17,400
Speaker 3: associate with feminism, and I think like Jezebel is probably

912
00:51:17,440 --> 00:51:20,640
Speaker 3: part of that. You know, we'll just have to keep reading.

913
00:51:20,680 --> 00:51:24,360
Speaker 3: One cat over at Substack, I know our fix.

914
00:51:25,600 --> 00:51:29,440
Speaker 1: Anna Merlin, who used to work at jez Bell now

915
00:51:29,520 --> 00:51:33,240
Speaker 1: works at Vice, where ironically they also had layoffs. Today

916
00:51:33,480 --> 00:51:36,440
Speaker 1: she was talking about how like our current media climate

917
00:51:36,480 --> 00:51:40,040
Speaker 1: feels like it's just a handful of legacy publications that

918
00:51:40,080 --> 00:51:43,440
Speaker 1: cannot possibly cover everything that needs to be covered to

919
00:51:43,520 --> 00:51:47,680
Speaker 1: the depth that it needs to ai generated garbage, and

920
00:51:48,440 --> 00:51:52,319
Speaker 1: you know, independent newsletters or substacks, and it's like, is

921
00:51:52,360 --> 00:51:53,520
Speaker 1: this our media climate?

922
00:51:53,640 --> 00:51:53,840
Speaker 3: Is this?

923
00:51:54,000 --> 00:51:54,320
Speaker 2: Is this?

924
00:51:54,640 --> 00:51:57,239
Speaker 1: Is this in this time where there is so much

925
00:51:57,320 --> 00:51:59,960
Speaker 1: going on, there's so much important stuff that we should

926
00:52:00,080 --> 00:52:02,880
Speaker 1: they be checked in on. Is this the media climate

927
00:52:02,920 --> 00:52:04,719
Speaker 1: that we have to help us way through it?

928
00:52:04,760 --> 00:52:04,960
Speaker 2: God?

929
00:52:05,000 --> 00:52:05,480
Speaker 1: I hope not.

930
00:52:06,080 --> 00:52:09,319
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's interesting because it connects with something else that

931
00:52:09,600 --> 00:52:11,960
Speaker 3: I think we've talked about on the past and in

932
00:52:12,000 --> 00:52:14,400
Speaker 3: the past, and probably we'll be talking about again the

933
00:52:15,239 --> 00:52:20,600
Speaker 3: shift in social media platforms like Facebook away from news.

934
00:52:21,280 --> 00:52:26,400
Speaker 3: Like there was a solid decade maybe longer, where news

935
00:52:26,640 --> 00:52:31,240
Speaker 3: content was like the main content that people were posting

936
00:52:31,280 --> 00:52:36,279
Speaker 3: and commenting on on platforms, and that's like explicitly no

937
00:52:36,400 --> 00:52:39,960
Speaker 3: longer the case, right, Facebook is moving away from it.

938
00:52:40,000 --> 00:52:44,120
Speaker 3: In places like Canada, they've banned it entirely, and I

939
00:52:44,239 --> 00:52:48,080
Speaker 3: have to imagine that that is very much connected with

940
00:52:48,160 --> 00:52:52,920
Speaker 3: this phenomenon that you were just talking about of our

941
00:52:54,600 --> 00:53:01,120
Speaker 3: media ecosystem being a handful of legacy outlets and all

942
00:53:01,200 --> 00:53:05,160
Speaker 3: of the you know, I don't know, alt journalism or

943
00:53:05,400 --> 00:53:10,160
Speaker 3: what would have been alt weeklies thirty years ago, are

944
00:53:11,120 --> 00:53:16,600
Speaker 3: I don't know less less abundant less. I'm sure they

945
00:53:16,960 --> 00:53:18,480
Speaker 3: would love to have some extra money.

946
00:53:19,080 --> 00:53:23,839
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know who got that money, don't You don't yet? Facebook,

947
00:53:24,080 --> 00:53:28,440
Speaker 1: Mark Zuckerberg, Cheryl Sandberg and fucking Adam Mosseerri. So thanks,

948
00:53:28,480 --> 00:53:32,280
Speaker 1: I'm happy that you have more money in the funky

949
00:53:32,400 --> 00:53:36,360
Speaker 1: sock budget and we local news is dead. Thanks, guys,

950
00:53:36,680 --> 00:53:40,080
Speaker 1: really appreciate it. This all sounds very doom and gloom,

951
00:53:40,160 --> 00:53:43,840
Speaker 1: but I mean, we have to choose hopefulness, like we

952
00:53:43,960 --> 00:53:48,919
Speaker 1: have to choose. I do see hope in the way

953
00:53:48,960 --> 00:53:53,520
Speaker 1: that people are saying, I don't fucking think so to

954
00:53:53,640 --> 00:53:55,759
Speaker 1: a lot of these tech billionaires and a lot of

955
00:53:55,760 --> 00:53:58,760
Speaker 1: the proposals that they lay out for how they intend

956
00:53:58,880 --> 00:54:02,360
Speaker 1: to continue to get rich off of us, whether it

957
00:54:02,480 --> 00:54:09,200
Speaker 1: is exploiting our likeness in prepartuity or forcing ads into

958
00:54:09,200 --> 00:54:14,000
Speaker 1: more and more of real estate online. So yeah, I

959
00:54:14,040 --> 00:54:17,000
Speaker 1: think there is reason for hope. We have to be

960
00:54:17,080 --> 00:54:22,160
Speaker 1: hopeful that something better can be out there on the horizon. Mike,

961
00:54:22,239 --> 00:54:23,840
Speaker 1: thank you so much for being here as.

962
00:54:23,680 --> 00:54:26,120
Speaker 3: Always, thanks for having me, and thanks for listening.

963
00:54:32,480 --> 00:54:34,560
Speaker 1: If you're looking for ways to support the show, check

964
00:54:34,600 --> 00:54:37,200
Speaker 1: out our March store at tegodi dot com slash store.

965
00:54:38,400 --> 00:54:40,440
Speaker 1: Got a story about an interesting thing in tech, or

966
00:54:40,520 --> 00:54:42,360
Speaker 1: just want to say hi, you can reach us at

967
00:54:42,400 --> 00:54:45,080
Speaker 1: Hello at tegodi dot com. You can also find transcripts

968
00:54:45,120 --> 00:54:47,560
Speaker 1: for today's episode at tengody dot com. There Are No

969
00:54:47,640 --> 00:54:49,680
Speaker 1: Girls on the Internet was created by me, which is Todd.

970
00:54:50,080 --> 00:54:53,239
Speaker 1: It's a production of iHeartRadio and Unbossed Creative edited by

971
00:54:53,320 --> 00:54:57,360
Speaker 1: Joey Pat Jonathan Stricklan as our executive producer, Tarry Harrison

972
00:54:57,400 --> 00:55:00,279
Speaker 1: as our producer and sound engineer. Michael Lamada was our

973
00:55:00,280 --> 00:55:03,319
Speaker 1: contributing producer. I'm your host, Bridget Todd. If you want

974
00:55:03,320 --> 00:55:04,839
Speaker 1: to help us grow, rate and review us.

975
00:55:04,800 --> 00:55:05,759
Speaker 2: On Apple Podcasts.

976
00:55:06,520 --> 00:55:09,319
Speaker 1: For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, check out the iHeartRadio app,

977
00:55:09,360 --> 00:55:15,560
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.