WEBVTT - Facebook Changes Name to Meta 0:00:01.800 --> 0:00:04.440 This is Bloomberg Business Week. I'm Carole Masser and I'm 0:00:04.480 --> 0:00:07.280 Bloomberg Quick Takes Tim Stanovik. We're here every day bringing 0:00:07.320 --> 0:00:09.840 you the latest news from the world to business and finance, 0:00:09.840 --> 0:00:13.640 plus technology, politics, economics, all furnishing the power of Business 0:00:13.680 --> 0:00:17.119 Week reporters and editors, not to mention our journalists and 0:00:17.120 --> 0:00:20.000 analysts in more than one twenty countries. You can download 0:00:20.000 --> 0:00:23.239 Bloomberg Business Week and iTunes, SoundCloud, or Bloomberg dot Com. 0:00:23.400 --> 0:00:25.200 You can also listen to our radio show at two 0:00:25.200 --> 0:00:27.880 pm Eastern Time on Bloomberg Radio, or watch us on 0:00:27.920 --> 0:00:32.239 YouTube search Bloomberg Clovel News. Alright, bunch of headlines when 0:00:32.240 --> 0:00:35.080 it comes to COVID. Today's City Bank. Uh, Tim, you 0:00:35.200 --> 0:00:38.080 pointed this out just before we got going today, requiring 0:00:38.120 --> 0:00:40.479 all use employees to be vaccinated against COVID as a 0:00:40.520 --> 0:00:44.560 condition of their employment, citing new orders from President Biden. 0:00:44.800 --> 0:00:46.320 I think that we're going to start seeing more and 0:00:46.400 --> 0:00:50.080 more of this from the big companies. Also Florida suing 0:00:50.080 --> 0:00:53.239 the Biden administration over vaccine mandates for federal contractors. This 0:00:53.280 --> 0:00:56.240 is the latest in a wave of Republican pushbacks against 0:00:56.280 --> 0:00:58.800 the President's orders to fight off the pandemic Closer to 0:00:58.840 --> 0:01:01.320 home where we are in New York City, the city 0:01:01.360 --> 0:01:05.040 saying it will temporarily outlaw days off for sanitation workers 0:01:05.040 --> 0:01:07.680 as needed ahead of an anticipated employee shortage stemming from 0:01:07.680 --> 0:01:09.960 a vaccine mandate is going into effect next week. We 0:01:10.040 --> 0:01:12.080 talked about supply chains. The U. S. Government has bought 0:01:12.120 --> 0:01:15.360 an additial fifty million doses of the fiser beyond bion 0:01:15.480 --> 0:01:18.679 Tech vaccine, and a push to secure supply for kids. 0:01:18.720 --> 0:01:20.959 All right, let's get to it. The Dr Anna Durban, 0:01:21.280 --> 0:01:24.080 Professor of International Health, Director of the Center for Immunization 0:01:24.160 --> 0:01:27.080 Research at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, 0:01:27.120 --> 0:01:30.760 supported by Michael R. Bloomberg, Founder, Bloomberg LP and Bloomberg Philanthropies. 0:01:30.959 --> 0:01:34.160 Dr Durban on the phone once again from Baltimore. Dr Durbin, 0:01:34.319 --> 0:01:36.920 Nice to have you back here on Bloomberg Radio. It's 0:01:36.959 --> 0:01:40.000 all about kids. Uh, what do you make of the 0:01:40.040 --> 0:01:43.880 progress so far? I think it's really excellent. I mean, 0:01:43.920 --> 0:01:47.080 I think it's it's good news that we're we have 0:01:47.120 --> 0:01:51.080 a vaccine that um will likely get approval from the 0:01:51.160 --> 0:01:53.680 CDC and their meeting next week. As we saw it 0:01:53.760 --> 0:01:56.760 was shown to be safe and efficacious. Uh, and the 0:01:56.880 --> 0:01:59.360 FDA approved the use of the vaccine and kids. It 0:01:59.400 --> 0:02:02.040 is a lower os um which I think is important 0:02:02.040 --> 0:02:05.000 to know because these kids are much smaller and don't 0:02:05.040 --> 0:02:07.840 need as much vaccine as adults, and that means that 0:02:08.320 --> 0:02:11.560 the side effects are are you know, less severing kids, 0:02:11.600 --> 0:02:14.120 which is good news. Dr Durban I was at the 0:02:14.160 --> 0:02:16.840 doctor yesterday. I was talking to a woman there who 0:02:16.919 --> 0:02:19.560 is a healthcare worker. She we're talking about our family. 0:02:19.680 --> 0:02:22.040 She said that her kids are over the age of five, 0:02:22.760 --> 0:02:25.120 and I said, that's great. They can get the vaccines 0:02:25.280 --> 0:02:27.680 very soon. And she said, I'm not going to get 0:02:27.680 --> 0:02:30.200 it for them now. I'm going to hold off on it. 0:02:30.400 --> 0:02:32.639 What would you say to parents who want to hold 0:02:32.680 --> 0:02:35.640 off and wait for more information. Well, what I would 0:02:35.680 --> 0:02:38.560 say is this, we know that, um, you know, the 0:02:38.680 --> 0:02:43.000 group now that's probably most susceptible to COVID is kids 0:02:43.160 --> 0:02:46.160 younger than twelve because they haven't had a vaccine available. 0:02:46.720 --> 0:02:50.040 We know that the virus can infect kids. We know 0:02:50.080 --> 0:02:53.959 that they can become symptomatic. It's true they aren't hospitalized 0:02:54.000 --> 0:02:57.440 to the high degree that particularly older adults are, but 0:02:57.520 --> 0:03:01.200 we do see severe disease in kids. We see multisystem 0:03:01.200 --> 0:03:05.120 inflammatory syndrome in kids. We see kids who are hospitalized 0:03:05.160 --> 0:03:06.639 to go to the i c U and we don't 0:03:06.639 --> 0:03:10.000 really understand why. You know, it's some kids may be 0:03:10.120 --> 0:03:13.320 affected more than others. Um I would try to reassure 0:03:13.320 --> 0:03:15.239 her that there is a lot of safety data of 0:03:15.280 --> 0:03:18.000 the vaccine, that we these vaccines have been studied in 0:03:18.160 --> 0:03:22.280 young kids, that the safety profile looks excellent, and that 0:03:22.360 --> 0:03:25.400 we can prevent again, we can prevent more transmission of 0:03:25.440 --> 0:03:30.160 the virus when kids are vaccinated when they're in schools. UM. 0:03:30.200 --> 0:03:33.800 It just provides greater safety for the population. The more 0:03:33.880 --> 0:03:36.760 people that we get vaccinated. So there's a headline, we've 0:03:36.760 --> 0:03:40.000 got a story on the Bloomberg. Vaccinated people also spread 0:03:40.000 --> 0:03:42.440 the delta variant. This is according to a year long study. 0:03:42.480 --> 0:03:45.720 So we're talking about people inoculated against COVID nineteen are 0:03:45.800 --> 0:03:47.640 just as likely to spread the delta variant of the 0:03:47.720 --> 0:03:50.800 virus to contacts in their household as those who have 0:03:50.960 --> 0:03:53.480 not had shots as according to some new research. It 0:03:53.600 --> 0:03:56.840 was a study a year long study people in the 0:03:56.920 --> 0:04:00.520 UK with mild COVID nineteam and scientists an that their 0:04:00.640 --> 0:04:04.480 peak viral load was similar regardless of vaccination status. According 0:04:04.520 --> 0:04:08.320 to paper published today in the Lancet Infectious Diseases Medical Journal. 0:04:08.840 --> 0:04:10.720 People are going to see the see that it probably 0:04:10.760 --> 0:04:12.160 sees on and say, see, I don't need to get 0:04:12.160 --> 0:04:15.839 the vaccine. Help us here. Yeah, So I think there's 0:04:15.840 --> 0:04:18.520 a couple of really important things to keep in mind 0:04:18.920 --> 0:04:21.520 when we look at PCR. When we look at at 0:04:21.760 --> 0:04:25.239 you know, measurements of the virus by PCR, it doesn't 0:04:25.240 --> 0:04:27.280 tell you whether that virus is a live or debt. 0:04:27.640 --> 0:04:29.960 It just tells you that there's pieces of the virus. 0:04:30.320 --> 0:04:33.920 We do know from studies that people who are vaccinated 0:04:34.360 --> 0:04:37.000 shed the virus for a shorter period of time, so 0:04:37.040 --> 0:04:39.640 they transmit the virus for a shorter period of time, 0:04:40.080 --> 0:04:44.880 and they actually transmit less live virus than people who 0:04:44.920 --> 0:04:49.640 are unvaccinated. It is true that vaccinated people can transmit 0:04:49.680 --> 0:04:52.800 the virus. We steam break Dr Durban forgive me just 0:04:52.839 --> 0:04:55.160 because we have been nuts and I know our audiences 0:04:55.240 --> 0:04:58.800 nuts about this. But Facebook is rebranding their company. The 0:04:58.920 --> 0:05:03.560 name change will be a m et A Facebook changing 0:05:03.560 --> 0:05:06.160 its name to Meta m E t A. We're gonna 0:05:06.600 --> 0:05:09.000 get back to that in just a moment um. But 0:05:09.120 --> 0:05:11.000 again it's something that we know our audience has been 0:05:11.000 --> 0:05:13.520 waiting for. We were expecting that name change as a 0:05:13.880 --> 0:05:17.760 host that event out there at Facebook headquarters. We're gonna 0:05:17.760 --> 0:05:19.040 get back to it in just a moment. Forgive me, 0:05:19.160 --> 0:05:22.440 Dr Durbin, please finish your thought. No no, I was 0:05:22.520 --> 0:05:24.400 just going to say, we you know, it's true that 0:05:24.440 --> 0:05:28.200 their breakthrough infections and vaccinated people, but we know that 0:05:28.320 --> 0:05:31.360 vaccinated people, even though they can shed the virus to 0:05:31.440 --> 0:05:34.360 transmit the virus, it's for a shorter period of time 0:05:35.080 --> 0:05:38.800 and it does provide protection. Um. The other thing that 0:05:38.839 --> 0:05:41.520 I would say is that how much virus shoes shed 0:05:41.720 --> 0:05:44.440 also is dependent on how ill you are, and we 0:05:44.480 --> 0:05:48.680 know that vaccines reduced the severity of illness incredibly. You know, 0:05:49.920 --> 0:05:53.920 people hospitalized now are unvaccinated, so there are a lot 0:05:53.960 --> 0:05:56.359 of factors that go into it. Their studies that have 0:05:56.480 --> 0:06:01.240 shown that vaccinated people are less likely to effect family 0:06:01.240 --> 0:06:05.719 members who are unvaccinated. So, um, you know, just having 0:06:05.839 --> 0:06:09.080 recovery of the virus by PCR isn't the whole story. 0:06:09.160 --> 0:06:14.200 And we know from multiple studies that vaccination reduces transmission. 0:06:14.480 --> 0:06:17.680 Dr Drvin, thank you so much, as always, over JOHNS. Hopkins, 0:06:17.760 --> 0:06:20.600 Bloomberg School of Public Health, on the phone from Baltimore. 0:06:20.760 --> 0:06:23.120 All right, we've got it. The name change for Facebook. 0:06:23.160 --> 0:06:25.400 It is Meta M E T A. And this obviously 0:06:25.480 --> 0:06:27.880 plays into the new focus, or a big focus at 0:06:27.920 --> 0:06:30.760 the company, the metaverse. Let's get to Tom Giles. He's 0:06:30.800 --> 0:06:34.240 Bloomberg Technology executive editor, joining us from our Bloomberg got 0:06:34.279 --> 0:06:38.440 San Francisco bureau. Tom, We've got it. Yeah, they finally 0:06:38.680 --> 0:06:43.120 they finally unveiled the new name. As you said, it's Meta. Um. 0:06:43.279 --> 0:06:46.159 This is really about Mark Zuckerberg and the rest of 0:06:46.200 --> 0:06:51.080 the executives at Facebook trying to rebrand, reimagine, get you 0:06:51.120 --> 0:06:54.600 to think about Facebook in a different way. UM. It's 0:06:54.640 --> 0:07:01.800 really emphasizing their planned multibillion dollar bet on the metaverse. 0:07:01.960 --> 0:07:05.520 This is this immersive world. UM. Think of it as 0:07:05.560 --> 0:07:09.360 a three D worldwide web that they want to be 0:07:09.800 --> 0:07:12.920 at the ground level of creating. UM, and they want 0:07:12.960 --> 0:07:17.080 you to think about their company as really a pioneer 0:07:17.120 --> 0:07:20.480 in this space. Um. They just spent an hour talking 0:07:20.520 --> 0:07:23.680 about the new hardware and software and other tools that 0:07:23.760 --> 0:07:28.400 they're created to give users the opportunity to immerse themselves 0:07:28.400 --> 0:07:32.200 in this thing called the metaverse, and they just chuckle. There. 0:07:33.840 --> 0:07:37.600 I did was a fascinating study of of kind of 0:07:37.640 --> 0:07:40.000 what they're what they're thinking about. It was really a 0:07:40.040 --> 0:07:43.520 trip inside the heads of Mark Zuckerberg and the other 0:07:43.560 --> 0:07:46.760 executives there um. And they're taking it very seriously and 0:07:46.840 --> 0:07:50.440 it's a big, bold and risky bet that they're taking. 0:07:50.440 --> 0:07:52.880 They're going to spend billions of dollars over the next 0:07:52.920 --> 0:07:56.520 five to ten years to build this out. How do 0:07:56.560 --> 0:07:58.520 they monetize this? I mean, I was watching part of 0:07:58.520 --> 0:08:02.080 this presentation as I was prepared for our programs. Tim, 0:08:02.080 --> 0:08:06.400 You're so silly monetization, But that's what investors care about, 0:08:06.520 --> 0:08:09.280 and first you got to get the eyeballs right. Well, 0:08:09.360 --> 0:08:12.440 I gotta tell you, even after watching that, I like 0:08:12.560 --> 0:08:14.280 life as it is and don't necessarily want to live 0:08:14.320 --> 0:08:16.720 in the metaverse or any time in the metaverse. How 0:08:16.720 --> 0:08:18.160 do they convince us to do that? And how do 0:08:18.200 --> 0:08:20.000 they make money doing it right? That's going to be 0:08:20.080 --> 0:08:22.960 a big challenge. So to answer your first question about 0:08:23.000 --> 0:08:27.520 the monetization, they are talking about all kinds of tools 0:08:27.640 --> 0:08:29.920 that you are going to be able to use. Spend 0:08:29.960 --> 0:08:33.200 a lot of time talking about e commerce. So you know, 0:08:33.280 --> 0:08:36.640 we've seen lots of big tech companies Amazon comes to mind, 0:08:36.960 --> 0:08:40.800 that have been able to monetize the way you buy 0:08:41.000 --> 0:08:44.920 and sell stuff, you know, virtually. Um, that's one thing 0:08:45.240 --> 0:08:49.600 they're also gaming. Um. They talked about Grand Theft Auto 0:08:50.240 --> 0:08:52.160 being one of the games that they're going to sell. 0:08:52.559 --> 0:08:56.199 And certainly as you look at wearing headsets, immersing yourself 0:08:56.200 --> 0:09:00.280 in these worlds, whether it's through a VR Virtual reality 0:09:00.320 --> 0:09:04.000 experience or an a R experience, you can imagine that 0:09:04.040 --> 0:09:06.640 there's going to be advertising sales. They didn't talk a 0:09:06.640 --> 0:09:09.400 lot about that, um, but I think that they will 0:09:09.440 --> 0:09:13.200 find ways to absolutely monetize this, although you know, and 0:09:13.240 --> 0:09:16.760 probably not right at the outset. Hey, Tom, I'm struck 0:09:16.840 --> 0:09:19.520 by something that I saw Shinali Bask, our colleague on 0:09:19.520 --> 0:09:22.520 Bloomberg TV right now, just tweet. She said that Zuckerberg said, 0:09:22.559 --> 0:09:25.040 from now on, we're going to be metaverse first, not 0:09:25.200 --> 0:09:28.480 Facebook first. It really makes me think back to when 0:09:28.480 --> 0:09:31.760 Mark Zuckerberg said that Facebook was going to be a 0:09:31.800 --> 0:09:34.920 mobile first company, and it emerged that he was making 0:09:34.960 --> 0:09:38.720 everybody only use their phones to access Facebook to build 0:09:38.720 --> 0:09:41.760 a mobile product. Fast forward where we are now. This 0:09:41.840 --> 0:09:45.160 is a company that is that really succeeded when it 0:09:45.160 --> 0:09:47.880 came to mobile and really surprised investors by by holding 0:09:47.880 --> 0:09:51.080 onto that. Yeah. Remember, and you know, at the time 0:09:51.080 --> 0:09:52.960 of their I p O, one of the things that 0:09:53.080 --> 0:09:57.160 really tripped them up for those first scary several months 0:09:57.160 --> 0:10:00.280 of their publicly tried but after their debut was that 0:10:00.360 --> 0:10:03.440 they hadn't mastered mobile. But as you said, that's something 0:10:03.480 --> 0:10:06.480 that they really tackled. They got us all, uh or 0:10:06.600 --> 0:10:09.720 all their users or many of their users to experience 0:10:09.800 --> 0:10:13.080 Facebook on the smartphone, and now they want to kind 0:10:13.080 --> 0:10:15.880 of move beyond that, and they want to be what's 0:10:16.000 --> 0:10:19.480 what's interesting about, you know, kind of making you think 0:10:19.520 --> 0:10:24.200 about Facebook differently. Facebook's name has really been the brand 0:10:24.200 --> 0:10:26.440 has really been tarnished by all of the things that 0:10:26.480 --> 0:10:29.080 we and others have been writing about for weeks and 0:10:29.120 --> 0:10:33.679 months and years, which is the preponderance of harmful content, 0:10:33.760 --> 0:10:37.800 whether it's hate speech, whether it's dis or disc or misinformation, 0:10:38.280 --> 0:10:42.800 um anti vax um, conspiracy theories. The list goes on 0:10:42.880 --> 0:10:45.559 and on and on the ways that Facebook has become 0:10:45.600 --> 0:10:48.680 a place that we associate with a lack of safety 0:10:48.679 --> 0:10:51.640 and a lack of protection. They want to start kind 0:10:51.640 --> 0:10:54.079 of over um and this is how they're going to 0:10:54.200 --> 0:10:56.679 do it. Right. Hey, you know, Mark Zuckerberg putting out 0:10:56.679 --> 0:10:58.360 a letter I'm just reading through it as as I 0:10:58.360 --> 0:11:01.120 wrote no original founders letter quote. We don't build services 0:11:01.160 --> 0:11:03.480 to make money. We make money to build better services. 0:11:03.800 --> 0:11:05.720 It's interesting, though, Tom, it comes at a time, just 0:11:05.800 --> 0:11:09.199 quickly twenty seconds as you say, this company is being 0:11:09.200 --> 0:11:14.360 looked at very very closely for its impact negatively on society. Absolutely, 0:11:14.400 --> 0:11:16.839 and you have a lot of lawmakers out there really 0:11:16.880 --> 0:11:19.679 taking a jaundice view of Facebook and the things that 0:11:19.760 --> 0:11:23.720 they say. Um, the stock is up, interestingly, so somebody 0:11:23.800 --> 0:11:26.680 likes what he's selling right now. Well, it could have 0:11:26.679 --> 0:11:29.240 been Facebook two point oh, that wouldn't have been so good. 0:11:29.280 --> 0:11:31.800 Tom Giles, you are amazing. Thank you for breaking it 0:11:31.840 --> 0:11:35.040 down and just making sense when it comes to Facebook's history. 0:11:35.040 --> 0:11:37.679 We're gonna talk and continue this conversation on Facebook's new name. 0:11:37.720 --> 0:11:40.320 It's meta at Level. Will be joining us from Menlo Park. 0:11:40.320 --> 0:11:42.960 He's on the ground there at Facebook headquarters. You're listening 0:11:42.960 --> 0:11:48.120 to Bloomberg Radio. This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol 0:11:48.200 --> 0:11:52.520 Messer and Bloomberg Quick Takes. Tim Stinovich from Bloomberg Radio. 0:11:53.000 --> 0:11:55.200 I must read in the new shoe Bloomberg Business Week 0:11:55.200 --> 0:11:57.000 by pri and Non and Mark Bergen. It's about a 0:11:57.000 --> 0:11:59.920 company called Go Guardian, the leading developer of ed text 0:12:00.040 --> 0:12:04.160 software educational tech software, and I guessed him to be fair, 0:12:04.200 --> 0:12:07.840 to be transparent. It's really about kind of educational surveillance software. 0:12:07.920 --> 0:12:11.960 That's right, Big teacher is watching spyware business sneaks into schools. 0:12:12.000 --> 0:12:14.280 Joe Weber is editor at Bloomberg Business Week. He's with 0:12:14.360 --> 0:12:17.280 us in the Bloomberg Interactive Broker Studio. Pre Ada's venture 0:12:17.280 --> 0:12:21.640 capital reporter for Bloomberg News. She joins us from San Francisco. Joel, 0:12:22.040 --> 0:12:26.839 What is the software Go Guardian? So it's it's one 0:12:26.920 --> 0:12:30.760 of a few that have become incredibly popular, uh, since 0:12:30.760 --> 0:12:32.880 the beginning of the pandemic, where you know, if you 0:12:32.960 --> 0:12:35.160 had a kid and the kid was in school maybe 0:12:35.520 --> 0:12:38.720 or not in school, but at home. Um, there was 0:12:38.760 --> 0:12:41.120 just this proliferation of devices all of a sudden. So 0:12:41.400 --> 0:12:43.640 so kids had iPads and laptops in a way that 0:12:43.880 --> 0:12:46.240 maybe they didn't always have before. And if it came 0:12:46.240 --> 0:12:49.320 from a school, if it was a you know, the 0:12:49.360 --> 0:12:53.240 Department of Education issued thing, chances are the school wanted 0:12:53.280 --> 0:12:55.040 to make sure that he could keep an eye on 0:12:55.120 --> 0:12:58.040 what the kid was doing. And now these companies have 0:12:58.280 --> 0:13:02.520 really boomed. Go guardian is the one that pre uh 0:13:02.760 --> 0:13:07.000 dug into for the story. Uh and yeah, what what 0:13:07.080 --> 0:13:08.599 do you think a kid is looking at during the 0:13:08.600 --> 0:13:11.920 school other than school? Right? Well, you know if you 0:13:11.920 --> 0:13:15.040 have gil guard Yeah, that's right. Uh So it also 0:13:15.120 --> 0:13:18.280 raises all kinds of privacy issues. So so pre what 0:13:18.360 --> 0:13:22.320 did you learn as you dug into this uh story? 0:13:22.800 --> 0:13:25.280 That's right? So the pandemic, I mean every school that 0:13:25.360 --> 0:13:28.440 hadn't given kids, um a laptop or a tablet of 0:13:28.440 --> 0:13:31.319 some sort, so many schools were forced to gross these 0:13:31.360 --> 0:13:34.520 things into kids's hands. And when they did that, they 0:13:34.520 --> 0:13:37.360 wanted to make sure they could ensure that kids weren't 0:13:37.360 --> 0:13:40.120 searching for I guess for our radio listeners all say 0:13:40.120 --> 0:13:43.360 problematic stuff on their school computers right when they're giving 0:13:43.400 --> 0:13:47.800 them access to the internet. So administrators at schools principles 0:13:47.960 --> 0:13:51.360 teachers we spoke with for this story, they all love this. 0:13:51.600 --> 0:13:54.360 Teachers say that even in the classroom when they're not 0:13:54.760 --> 0:13:57.280 you know, remote, now that they're back, it helps them 0:13:57.800 --> 0:14:00.640 when they want kids to look at maybe a worksheet 0:14:00.679 --> 0:14:04.080 of some sort, or have an exam open that's online, 0:14:04.120 --> 0:14:07.120 which is much easier to grade for them, um, And 0:14:07.160 --> 0:14:09.319 then they can make sure that the kid only has 0:14:09.440 --> 0:14:12.360 the certain tabs open that they have said are okay 0:14:12.480 --> 0:14:15.320 during class. So a math teacher can block YouTube, for example, 0:14:15.400 --> 0:14:17.520 during their class. If they see a kid open another 0:14:17.600 --> 0:14:20.360 tab with a game or something like that, they can 0:14:20.520 --> 0:14:23.200 close out that tab immediately for them from their own 0:14:23.240 --> 0:14:26.280 computer at their desk. And teachers think that this is 0:14:26.320 --> 0:14:28.080 a way to like, you know, actually be able to 0:14:28.120 --> 0:14:30.240 focus on teaching, right if you can block all the 0:14:30.240 --> 0:14:32.520 other stuff that, you know, the kid can't access anything 0:14:32.560 --> 0:14:34.360 else in their computer. Kind of sounds like the Bloomberg 0:14:34.360 --> 0:14:37.520 firewalls just putting it out there. Um, but we understand 0:14:37.520 --> 0:14:39.640 why we have a lot of information to protect here. Um. 0:14:39.720 --> 0:14:43.040 The schools decide, though, right what to block on kids computers. 0:14:43.520 --> 0:14:46.840 The schools decide what to block on kids as computers. 0:14:46.960 --> 0:14:50.240 But the interesting thing is that the schools can also 0:14:50.320 --> 0:14:53.720 decide to turn on a feature that allows them too. 0:14:54.000 --> 0:14:56.680 If the kids logged into their school account on a 0:14:56.720 --> 0:15:01.520 personal computer at home, go Guardian can still continue tracking, monitoring, 0:15:01.640 --> 0:15:04.600 et cetera while the kid has logged into that school account. Now, 0:15:04.680 --> 0:15:07.480 not every school turns this on. Go Guardian wouldn't give 0:15:07.520 --> 0:15:10.240 us a bigger on how many schools that they're involved 0:15:10.280 --> 0:15:13.560 with have turned this on. But there was protests in Montclair, 0:15:13.640 --> 0:15:17.320 New Jersey over this um and parents wondered, you know, 0:15:17.360 --> 0:15:19.400 where does the tracking end then if if this can 0:15:19.480 --> 0:15:22.280 happen on a personal device preta. One thing that you 0:15:22.360 --> 0:15:24.480 explore in the piece is just about the role of 0:15:24.520 --> 0:15:27.600 computers in school because for your Silicon Valley and even 0:15:27.600 --> 0:15:32.400 Mark Zuckerberg in Newark almost a decade ago, wanted to 0:15:32.440 --> 0:15:35.200 help connect classrooms. And I'm wondering what you learned and 0:15:35.200 --> 0:15:37.320 what you can tell us about the role of computers 0:15:37.320 --> 0:15:39.320 in school. Did they reach a turning point during the 0:15:39.320 --> 0:15:42.560 pandemic because of remote learning? That's right. So what struck 0:15:42.560 --> 0:15:46.040 me about companies like go Guardian is how much scale 0:15:46.080 --> 0:15:47.960 they've been able to achieve the far right, just how 0:15:47.960 --> 0:15:50.720 many schools across the country they reach and how many 0:15:50.720 --> 0:15:53.600 students across the country reach Go Guardian, for example, they're 0:15:53.600 --> 0:15:55.440 one of the biggest companies that makes these kind of 0:15:55.440 --> 0:15:59.720 tracking tools and their reach is a potential twenty three 0:15:59.720 --> 0:16:03.720 million and students or more. Entire states have signed up, 0:16:03.720 --> 0:16:06.680 like Delaware and West Virginia, giving access to all the 0:16:06.720 --> 0:16:09.400 schools in their states, which means the school can decide 0:16:09.400 --> 0:16:11.960 whether or not they want to use these tools. But um, 0:16:12.120 --> 0:16:14.120 you know, New York City has signed up large school 0:16:14.160 --> 0:16:16.680 district in the country. So that's what struck us as 0:16:16.720 --> 0:16:19.920 as quite different from a lot of the other efforts 0:16:19.960 --> 0:16:22.840 in education technology. Right. I mean, a bunch of Googlers 0:16:22.880 --> 0:16:26.400 started a company called Old School a couple of years back. Um, 0:16:26.480 --> 0:16:28.800 it ended up shutting down the schools it started. The 0:16:28.840 --> 0:16:31.360 schools had like three D printers and and all this 0:16:31.520 --> 0:16:33.640 fancy high tech stuff. But then they got out of 0:16:33.640 --> 0:16:35.480 the business spout bring of schools and they only even 0:16:35.480 --> 0:16:38.120 had you know, not that many, nothing at this scale. 0:16:38.560 --> 0:16:42.040 And the Zuckerberg New Work relationship that was that was 0:16:42.120 --> 0:16:45.320 just new Work, right, It wasn't UM across the country. 0:16:45.600 --> 0:16:47.840 So so this really struck us as something that you know, 0:16:47.960 --> 0:16:51.000 even though the pandemic UM really gave them a big 0:16:51.000 --> 0:16:54.080 boost in popularity, it doesn't seem like this kind of 0:16:54.120 --> 0:16:57.960 monitoring technology is going away. Um now that things are 0:16:58.000 --> 0:17:01.360 are back in person and they have achieved just a 0:17:01.480 --> 0:17:04.400 much larger base of users across the country. I gotta 0:17:04.440 --> 0:17:07.760 say it seems pretty basic to put a little firewall 0:17:07.800 --> 0:17:11.320 on an education device and limit what kids might be 0:17:11.920 --> 0:17:15.200 able to access and give some teachers ability to see 0:17:15.200 --> 0:17:17.400 what they're looking at. What are the numbers? Like, how 0:17:17.480 --> 0:17:21.960 lucrative of a business idea is this? Go Guardian UM 0:17:22.000 --> 0:17:26.480 They themselves charge about five dollars per student per product 0:17:26.600 --> 0:17:29.840 at a school or school district on that's more than 0:17:29.880 --> 0:17:34.680 the school lunch I think they've got. They've got multiple 0:17:34.680 --> 0:17:37.000 products going on too. There's like a you know, a 0:17:37.000 --> 0:17:39.480 whole host of tools for teachers, specifically a host of 0:17:39.520 --> 0:17:43.400 tools for administrators, UM, a host of tools to kind 0:17:43.400 --> 0:17:47.120 of assigned devices to different kids and like track where 0:17:47.160 --> 0:17:50.080 they are. So it's depended on how they set up 0:17:50.200 --> 0:17:52.000 you know, the service, but you have five dollars per 0:17:52.119 --> 0:17:56.760 student at minimum, right, So okay, the most one of 0:17:56.760 --> 0:17:59.760 the one of the most uh searched for things that 0:18:00.160 --> 0:18:02.280 out when students are on Go Guardian is how do 0:18:02.320 --> 0:18:04.240 you get around Go Guardian? How do you get around it? 0:18:05.320 --> 0:18:07.840 You know? So actually we asked a company about this 0:18:07.920 --> 0:18:09.840 and you're like, hey, you know we heard that kids 0:18:10.040 --> 0:18:13.160 kids do constantly search like how to get around your 0:18:13.200 --> 0:18:16.399 tech and and their engineers watch those videos too, and 0:18:16.440 --> 0:18:18.800 if they see something, they you know, close it up. 0:18:18.800 --> 0:18:20.639 But it's not something they seem to be that worried 0:18:20.640 --> 0:18:22.800 about they think they've got things pretty locked down. I 0:18:22.880 --> 0:18:24.199 just think it's funny on a day where we just 0:18:24.200 --> 0:18:26.679 had Facebook getting a new name Meta because we know 0:18:26.720 --> 0:18:31.040 they're focusing on the metaverse and that actually with Go Guardian, 0:18:31.160 --> 0:18:34.320 there is a penalty box, right kind of, I guess 0:18:34.320 --> 0:18:36.879 a virtual one that they can that kids can be 0:18:36.920 --> 0:18:38.399 put in. And I just think you can see a 0:18:38.520 --> 0:18:41.399 melding of the metaverse, right the kids are put in 0:18:41.440 --> 0:18:45.520 like a penalty metaverse. Remembering the kids I went to 0:18:45.520 --> 0:18:47.840 school with who were in that box. Now you know, 0:18:47.920 --> 0:18:50.680 like they probably are still in it. You know, it's 0:18:50.720 --> 0:18:53.040 just crazy, like how it's all gonna meil together? Um? 0:18:53.200 --> 0:18:54.879 Is this a company that's going to probably go public 0:18:54.880 --> 0:18:58.040 at sometime just quickly? You know. Earlier this year they 0:18:58.119 --> 0:19:01.280 raised two million dollars put their valuation at over a 0:19:01.320 --> 0:19:05.360 billion dollars. So given the recent fundraising, who knows right 0:19:05.600 --> 0:19:07.119 that they have a lot of money right now at 0:19:07.160 --> 0:19:10.720 least sixth band unbelievable, Um and fascinating and deep dive. 0:19:10.760 --> 0:19:13.000 There's so much to this story. Thank you so much, 0:19:13.040 --> 0:19:15.719 really appreciate Bloomberg News Venture Capital reporter Priya and Non 0:19:15.800 --> 0:19:17.680 joining us on the phone. From San Francisco on with 0:19:17.680 --> 0:19:19.520 Bloomberg business Week at or Joel Webber, what do you 0:19:19.520 --> 0:19:23.560 think of Meta? Uh? Roofline in the magazine coming out now? 0:19:23.920 --> 0:19:26.879 That shift yesterday is Facebook's meta pivot. I feel like 0:19:26.920 --> 0:19:29.080 I should be in the gambling universe. I just go 0:19:30.240 --> 0:19:32.720 ahead of the curve man. All right, everybody, we gotta 0:19:32.760 --> 0:19:35.560 run um Joe Weber, thank you so much, Business Week editor, 0:19:35.600 --> 0:19:37.720 of course, and check out that new issue. It is 0:19:37.760 --> 0:19:42.439 on newsstands on the Bloomberg and at business Week dot com. 0:19:42.480 --> 0:19:46.080 You're listening to Bloomberg business Week with Carol Messer and 0:19:46.160 --> 0:19:52.560 Bloomberg Quick Takes Tim Stinovic on Bloomberg Radio. So it's official, uh, 0:19:53.040 --> 0:19:56.639 Meta formerly known as Facebook the artist formerly known as Facebook? 0:19:57.040 --> 0:19:58.720 Are you gonna keep calling it Facebook? Are you gonna 0:19:58.800 --> 0:20:02.320 start calling from three? Technically, it's still trading right under Facebook. 0:20:02.320 --> 0:20:05.280 It doesn't start trading under the new ticker until December one, 0:20:05.440 --> 0:20:06.879 So I guess it's going to be kind of one 0:20:06.880 --> 0:20:09.920 of those Google slash alphabet like you know that confusion 0:20:09.920 --> 0:20:12.320 that we went through initially when they made the name change. Well, 0:20:12.320 --> 0:20:15.040 that's what I'm wondering. Unfortunately, now Ed Lovelow is joining US. 0:20:15.080 --> 0:20:17.560 He's West Coast corresponding at Bloomberg News. He's on site 0:20:17.560 --> 0:20:20.800 from Facebook headquarters in Menlo Park, California. I believe he's 0:20:20.800 --> 0:20:23.680 a one hacker away in front of what was until 0:20:23.680 --> 0:20:27.000 today a famous Facebook like sign thumbs up that you're 0:20:27.000 --> 0:20:29.879 seeing on YouTube right now. But now the sign has changed. 0:20:30.640 --> 0:20:33.080 Ed when did they When did they pull the cover 0:20:33.119 --> 0:20:34.720 off that brand new sign that you're standing in front 0:20:34.720 --> 0:20:40.399 of nine seconds well to Mark Zuckerberg announced it nine 0:20:40.600 --> 0:20:42.800 and it was amazing. Over my shoulder, you know, they're 0:20:42.840 --> 0:20:46.200 standing there, had this temporary canvas over it, and whoosh, 0:20:46.240 --> 0:20:48.520 they just pull the canvas off. The sign is that 0:20:48.560 --> 0:20:51.480 famous sign everyone knows, right for our radio audience as well, 0:20:51.480 --> 0:20:54.080 with the thumbs up like symbol, and it's changed now 0:20:54.119 --> 0:20:56.840 to this meta symbol. But what you guys were discussing 0:20:56.840 --> 0:20:59.480