Speaker 1: There Are No Girls on the Internet, as a production
Speaker 1: of iHeartRadio and Unbossed Creative. I'm Bridget Todd and this
Speaker 1: is there Are No Girls on the Internet. I'm here
Speaker 1: with my producer, Mike. Thanks for being here.
Speaker 2: Mike, Hey, Bridget, thanks for having me.
Speaker 3: And here's what you may have missed this week on
Speaker 3: the Internet.
Speaker 1: But first I have to do a little bit of
Speaker 1: a I don't know PSA announcement. This is the situation
Speaker 1: I'm calling Cameo Cinderella. So five years ago, somebody from
Speaker 1: the platform Cameo, which is a platform that you can
Speaker 1: have public figures or famous people give you like birthday
Speaker 1: shout outs. About five years ago, somebody from Cameo got
Speaker 1: in touch with me and they said, hey, you should
Speaker 1: be on Cameo. This was like a real ego boost
Speaker 1: for me. I was like, Oh my god, do you
Speaker 1: think that people would really want to like pay me
Speaker 1: to give them like a video greeting.
Speaker 3: I signed up. I became of the platform.
Speaker 1: Literally five years go by, no one requests a goddamn
Speaker 1: thing whatever.
Speaker 3: I was humbled.
Speaker 1: But last week I got my first ever Cameo request.
Speaker 1: But because I had never used the platform and it
Speaker 1: had just been dormant for five years. I didn't really
Speaker 1: know how it worked.
Speaker 3: I didn't know that.
Speaker 1: The requests expired, so I was not able to fill
Speaker 1: my first ever cameo request.
Speaker 3: I feel terrible about it.
Speaker 1: So it was from somebody named Jason and they were
Speaker 1: requesting a cameo pep talk from me. It sounds like
Speaker 1: Jason is writing a children's book that sounds really amazing. Jason,
Speaker 1: if you are listening, or if you know somebody named
Speaker 1: Jason and you think you know this is the person,
Speaker 1: email me. I am so sorry that I did not
Speaker 1: fulfill your cameo request. It was my first ever in
Speaker 1: five years.
Speaker 3: Time email me.
Speaker 1: You do not have to pay. I would love to
Speaker 1: send you a video pep talk. Hit me up at
Speaker 1: Hello at tangoti dot com. I'm so sorry I'm missing
Speaker 1: so yeah, I just wanted to say that.
Speaker 3: Jason. If you're listening, I'm sorry. Yeah.
Speaker 2: I hope Jason is out. I hope you heard from
Speaker 2: Jason me too.
Speaker 3: So let's get into the news.
Speaker 1: So first, there's one story that just makes me so happy,
Speaker 1: even though it was obvious to anybody paying attention, but
Speaker 1: it's what makes me happy, and that is Ruby and
Speaker 1: Shae Freeman have been cleared of all wrongdoing officially. Now
Speaker 1: this is really obvious to anybody who's been paying attention
Speaker 1: to this story, but it's still a good thing if
Speaker 1: you don't remember. Ruby and Shae Freeman are the black
Speaker 1: mother daughter duo who were poll workers in Georgia who
Speaker 1: Trump and Rudy Giuliani baselessly accused of tampering with votes
Speaker 1: in the Georgia presidential election in twenty twenty that Trump
Speaker 1: lost Farren Square. They have been officially cleared of all wrongdoing.
Speaker 1: An investigative report released this week by the Georgia Elections
Speaker 1: Board of the twenty twenty election found that all of
Speaker 1: the claims that they had mishandled votes, that they were
Speaker 1: moving votes, all of that stuff that Trump made up
Speaker 1: was all found to be false and unsubstantiated. The report
Speaker 1: also found that fake social media accounts and impersonation played
Speaker 1: a role, which is something that we talk about a
Speaker 1: lot on this podcast. As part of the robe, the
Speaker 1: Georgia Election Board investigators interviewed a social media user who
Speaker 1: admitted that they created a fake account and confirmed that
Speaker 1: the content that was posted on this account was fake.
Speaker 1: Vonda Boy, the attorney representing the women said in a
Speaker 1: statement following the release of the report that this serves
Speaker 1: as further evidence that Miss Freeman and Miss Moss, while
Speaker 1: doing their patriotic duty and serving their community, were simply
Speaker 1: collateral damage and a corugated effort to undermine the results
Speaker 1: of the twenty twenty presidential election. We talked about this
Speaker 1: story kind of in depth on the podcast. The women
Speaker 1: testified at the January sixth Commission about how terrifying the
Speaker 1: harassment and violence that they faced got for them after
Speaker 1: Trump and Juliani basically just lied about them, and their
Speaker 1: testimony really broke me because I think it put a
Speaker 1: human face on things like conspiracy theories and disinformation.
Speaker 3: This was just like a mother and daughter who wanted
Speaker 3: to serve their community.
Speaker 1: The daughter had been working as a poleworker for a
Speaker 1: while because she really cared for the elders in her
Speaker 1: community and wanted to help those elders vote.
Speaker 3: These are people who.
Speaker 1: Were really really motivated by their civic duties and that
Speaker 1: motivation was turned against them. And so you know, if
Speaker 1: folks have not heard their testimony, I definitely recommend checking
Speaker 1: out the episode that we did on them, But it
Speaker 1: is heartbreaking because it really puts a face on what
Speaker 1: ordinary citizens have to deal with when the president uses
Speaker 1: his office to target them, lie about them, and smeared them.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 1: Right wing blogs published their pictures and their names and
Speaker 1: saying they were moving suitcases full of ballots and from
Speaker 1: polling places they weren't. Giuliani got real racist with it,
Speaker 1: saying that he had a video of the women passing
Speaker 1: a USB drive to each other, quote as if they
Speaker 1: were vials of heroin or crack, even though they were
Speaker 1: just passing a piece of candy to each other. At
Speaker 1: one point, an angry mob of Trump supporters descended on
Speaker 1: their grandmother's home and tried to strong arm their way
Speaker 1: into her house to make a citizen arrest. I can't
Speaker 1: even imagine how terrifying that must have been. Eventually, she
Speaker 1: had to just pack up and leave her home that
Speaker 1: she had lived in for twenty years for her own safety.
Speaker 1: So this was a very real, very terrifying harassment campaign
Speaker 1: that an elderly black woman and her daughter went through
Speaker 1: just because they wanted to serve their communities, and Trump
Speaker 1: and his cronies were looking.
Speaker 3: For a scapegoat to pin their election loss on.
Speaker 1: I was also really pleased that they both got a
Speaker 1: presidential medal from Biden, along with ten others who made
Speaker 1: exemplary contributions to our democracy. Surrounding January six, we did
Speaker 1: a whole episode on Ruby and Shay on my Cool
Speaker 1: Zone podcast Internet Hate Machine, So definitely check it out.
Speaker 1: We'll link it in the comments. But I think it's
Speaker 1: really important to point out that what those women went
Speaker 1: through was a racist, sexist disinformation campaign that really weaponized
Speaker 1: and relied on their identities as black women to work.
Speaker 3: You know. I think that when Trump and Juliani just.
Speaker 1: Saw a video of two black women working in the
Speaker 1: polls in Georgia, he knew that he could capitalize off
Speaker 1: of their base and society at large's distrust of black women.
Speaker 3: And so I think that that is why that.
Speaker 1: Particular smear campaign stuck so well for them, because I
Speaker 1: think they knew, like, oh, be on a video of
Speaker 1: two black women, you know, work in the polls in Georgia,
Speaker 1: we could just put it on them. So I'm really
Speaker 1: pleased that what was obvious now is part of the
Speaker 1: public record that these women were just collateral damage in
Speaker 1: a racist, sexist smear campaign for simply trying to serve
Speaker 1: their communities, and I'm every new update about them that
Speaker 1: I hear, I'm just rooting for them, you know. I
Speaker 1: hope that they sue the pants off of everybody and
Speaker 1: get everybody's money, But nothing can make right what they
Speaker 1: went through. These women are heroes, but they should not
Speaker 1: have to be heroes. They should not have to face
Speaker 1: Donald Trump, a sitting president, for simply wanting to exist
Speaker 1: and do their jobs and serve their community. So I'm
Speaker 1: really deeply rooting for these women. This news makes me.
Speaker 3: Really happy, but they should I ever have had to
Speaker 3: go through this in the first place.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's nice to see the exoneration. I guess it's
Speaker 2: like years later, right, like three years later. Hopefully they
Speaker 2: get some peace at this point. And yeah, I wonder
Speaker 2: if they're gonna be suing people, you know, maybe they
Speaker 2: should get in contact with Egene Carroll's lawyers. Part of
Speaker 2: me hopes that this is the last time we talk
Speaker 2: about them on the show, because they're able to just
Speaker 2: like step out of the public spotlight that they never
Speaker 2: sought and just like return to normal lives. But yeah,
Speaker 2: part of me wonders if maybe we will hear more
Speaker 2: from them. You know, they suffered a lot for no reason.
Speaker 2: Maybe they'll sue people. They probably should. They certainly seems
Speaker 2: like they could.
Speaker 1: I think they were where they had an active lawsuit
Speaker 1: against the Gateway Pundit, one of the right wing blogs
Speaker 1: that first put their name and picture into the right
Speaker 1: wing blog a sphere.
Speaker 3: And it's funny that you bring up Egen Carroll.
Speaker 1: Something that I think about quite a bit is that
Speaker 1: Egen Carrol won her defamation lawsuit against Trump. The very
Speaker 1: next day he went on CNN and continued to defame her.
Speaker 1: She said that she might actually sue him again, and
Speaker 1: obviously the same as with Ruby and Shay, I am
Speaker 1: rooting for Egen Carroll.
Speaker 3: But here's the thing.
Speaker 1: She should be able to rest, just like you said,
Speaker 1: she shouldn't have to be constantly gearing up for lawsuit
Speaker 1: after lawsuit after lawsuit just to get some peace. And
Speaker 1: so I'm rooting for these women. I believe that these
Speaker 1: women should get what they deserve for what Trump and
Speaker 1: these assholes put them through. But they should not have
Speaker 1: to continually fight these battles against this person who continues
Speaker 1: to lie about them. So I'm with you, I'm wishing
Speaker 1: them some peace, but always rooting for them. I want
Speaker 1: them to take these assholes for everything there work because
Speaker 1: they deserve it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely like they deserve it. They deserve everything they
Speaker 2: can get. And then also in terms of the bigger picture,
Speaker 2: one of the things we talked about at the beginning
Speaker 2: of this season is how it's starting to look like
Speaker 2: litigation and defamation lawsuits might be an important strategy in
Speaker 2: trying to rein in online disinformation in this time when
Speaker 2: it seems like a lot of platforms are actually going
Speaker 2: in the opposite direction of making it easier for people
Speaker 2: to just lie online and spread harmful misinformation and target
Speaker 2: people for coordinated attacks. As people are surveying the landscape
Speaker 2: of what is actually an effective way to try to
Speaker 2: rein it in, it does seem like these lawsuits might
Speaker 2: be an important piece of that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think we're going to see more and more
Speaker 3: of that.
Speaker 1: I think the episode we started the season with Nita
Speaker 1: jank With sueing Fox News for defamation. I'm curious to
Speaker 1: see what the future looks like for people who lie
Speaker 1: for profit. I hope it's not a good one, because
Speaker 1: I don't think that serves anybody. Speaking of people who
Speaker 1: profit off the flies and harassment.
Speaker 3: Let's talk about Elon Musk.
Speaker 1: I should say this episode, we're gonna mention Elon Musk
Speaker 1: a few times. I feel like y'all have heard me
Speaker 1: say now, like, oh, I'm not gonna talk about Elon Musk,
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna bring him up.
Speaker 3: I'm just gonna like ignore him.
Speaker 1: But then I talk about him every news Roundup because
Speaker 1: he just stays in the news. So trigger warning, this
Speaker 1: is a Musk heavy episode and maybe they should actually
Speaker 1: be a new round Up segment.
Speaker 2: What's Elon done now?
Speaker 1: Well, now, Elon Musk has declared the words cis and
Speaker 1: cisgender will now be considered slurs on Twitter that can
Speaker 1: be punishable with suspension.
Speaker 3: Let's get into it.
Speaker 1: So Elon Musk has essentially invented two new slurs, cis
Speaker 1: and cisgender. So the word sis or sis gender is
Speaker 1: not some big scary word. It simply describes someone who
Speaker 1: identifies their gender as the same as their birth sex.
Speaker 1: So how did this whole thing on Twitter start? Well,
Speaker 1: it started when James Essy's an Irish right wing social
Speaker 1: media personality who writes articles about things like the threat
Speaker 1: of wokeness and trans and inclusion, while he complains that
Speaker 1: people were calling him sissy on Twitter, writing yesterday, after
Speaker 1: posting a tweet saying that I reject the word CIS
Speaker 1: and I don't wish to be called it, I received
Speaker 1: a slew of messages from transactivists calling me sissy and
Speaker 1: telling me that I am sis, whether I like it
Speaker 1: or not. Just imagine if the roles were reversed. So
Speaker 1: Musk replied, saying, repeated targeted harassment against any account will
Speaker 1: cause the harassing account to receive at minimum temporary suspensions.
Speaker 1: The word CIS or cisgender are considered slurs on this platform. Now. Ugh,
Speaker 1: So this goes back to what we were talking about
Speaker 1: last week, how so much of Elon Musk's whole thing,
Speaker 1: not just his personal identity but how he makes business
Speaker 1: and strategy decisions is grounded in transphobia. To put this
Speaker 1: in context with that Glad report that we talked about
Speaker 1: last week, finding that Twitter is by far the least
Speaker 1: hospitable social media platform for LGBTQ folks and that Twitter
Speaker 1: had actually rolled back policies that did the bare minimum
Speaker 1: of keeping transphobia off the platform, while other social media
Speaker 1: platforms like Facebook or TikTok try to do some things.
Speaker 3: Twitter was like, now we're going in the opposite direction.
Speaker 3: We're going to do less.
Speaker 1: Lgbtqu users are reporting being threatened and harassed on Twitter,
Speaker 1: and Musk is not just allowing it, but amplifying it
Speaker 1: and encouraging it. So this gus down into the question
Speaker 1: of whether or not cis is a slur no end
Speaker 1: of sentence, it is not. The history behind the word
Speaker 1: cis is actually like kind of techy and pretty cool,
Speaker 1: especially like if you're a word nerd, if you're interested
Speaker 1: in the origins of words. According to history dot org,
Speaker 1: the term has a long and contested history prior to
Speaker 1: its wider cultural adoption. The OED officially cites a nineteen
Speaker 1: ninety four post to a usenet newsgroup alt that transgendered
Speaker 1: by user Dana Leland de FOSSi as the term's origin.
Speaker 1: First established in nineteen eighty, Usenet was a precursor to
Speaker 1: the World Wide Web. It's a distributed discussion system where
Speaker 1: users posted messages to topics specific news groups. Given its
Speaker 1: long history, use net is the origin point for a
Speaker 1: variety of terminology, providing the first use case for over
Speaker 1: four hundred oed entries. Nevertheless, other origin narratives persist some
Speaker 1: sources for many years. Wikipedia, among them, credit a Dutch
Speaker 1: transgender man named Carl Bousch as creating the term in
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety five, a narrative he himself supports. Yet examples
Speaker 1: of the CIS trans dichotomy in reference to gender nonconformity
Speaker 1: go back even further, beginning as early as nineteen fourteen
Speaker 1: in German sexological literature. This is really interesting. I know
Speaker 1: we were talking a bit off Mike before we got started,
Speaker 1: but I actually had never heard of usenet, and you
Speaker 1: were like, oh, you don't know about and use that.
Speaker 3: This is something that you were familiar with, right, Yeah.
Speaker 2: It was a little bit before my time. I wish
Speaker 2: I was cool enough to have been using it, but
Speaker 2: it's an important piece of like Internet lore. I think
Speaker 2: all of the founding creators of the Internet, they were
Speaker 2: using it to connect with each other and collaborate and
Speaker 2: share software and share ideas. And I think a lot
Speaker 2: of the the ideas that we had in the early
Speaker 2: days of the Internet about it, like being a force
Speaker 2: for democratization and equality and freedom and openness. I think
Speaker 2: a lot of those ideas really were incubated on Usenet,
Speaker 2: which you know, was then eventually supplanted by services like
Speaker 2: America Online and then the world Wide Web I think
Speaker 2: was a more similar sort of open I don't even
Speaker 2: know what the.
Speaker 4: World Wide Web?
Speaker 2: Is it a protocol, is it whatever? But yeah, Usenet
Speaker 2: was just a critical important place for early founders and
Speaker 2: creators of what we now think of as the Internet
Speaker 2: where it all happened.
Speaker 4: More after a quick break, let's get right back into it.
Speaker 3: I love that.
Speaker 1: The etymology of the word in this instance is like
Speaker 1: techie like, I think identity and techiness like. It doesn't
Speaker 1: surprise me that this is where some where folks think
Speaker 1: that this may be where some of these terms originated.
Speaker 3: And like where their use came from.
Speaker 1: Aaron Reid also has a really fascinating breakdown about the
Speaker 1: use of the word sis in medicine and science going
Speaker 1: back to the nineteenth century. We'll put it in the
Speaker 1: show notes. It's fascinating. So of all the moral panics,
Speaker 1: I find the ones around language and gender to be
Speaker 1: the most tiresome. You know, it's just like this panic
Speaker 1: around extremists getting bent out of shape from phrases like
Speaker 1: pregnant people. Extremists make it sound like it's some big, scary,
Speaker 1: nefarious plot.
Speaker 3: When the reality is so much more boring.
Speaker 1: Right, sometimes you need to be able to refer to
Speaker 1: a group of people at the population, let level using
Speaker 1: precise language, and that's really all it is. Like the
Speaker 1: fact that they've been able to turn this into a
Speaker 1: attack on them as opposed to just like a humdrum,
Speaker 1: you know, particularity of language needs is beyond me. Like
Speaker 1: it really just shows how they will use anything to
Speaker 1: weaponize and turn it into it an attack on them.
Speaker 1: And extremists have been attacking terms like CIS and also
Speaker 1: straight and even white for years to paint it as
Speaker 1: a pejorative meant to shame. I think there is this
Speaker 1: idea where like, the only groups who have kind of
Speaker 1: special quote unquote special words meant to define them are
Speaker 1: like the other, right, Like the dominant group is like,
Speaker 1: we're the dominant group, we're the quote normal ones.
Speaker 3: Other people they.
Speaker 1: Get words attached to them to describe who they are,
Speaker 1: not us. And so I think there's this idea that
Speaker 1: if a word is being used to describe them, whether
Speaker 1: it's CIS or straight or white, even if it's just
Speaker 1: a humdrum word that is actually a personal attack on them.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's right, and I think that's all correct, and
Speaker 2: not to minimize the importance of words and language, right,
Speaker 2: because we know that words and language and labels are
Speaker 2: very powerful. But yeah, there's like this hostility to to
Speaker 2: labels like cis or white that apply to the majority group.
Speaker 2: Like you just said, you know, it's they're they're comfortable
Speaker 2: with words that refer to members of a minority group
Speaker 2: and in fact reinforce their otherness and their minority status. Uh,
Speaker 2: but to then have a word like white or cists
Speaker 2: that refers to to them is like deeply threatening because
Speaker 2: I think it implies that they are not the default.
Speaker 2: They are not normal, they are not the standard. And
Speaker 2: it's like, yeah, the word cis it does imply that
Speaker 2: trans people exist, and I think a lot of these folks,
Speaker 2: like Elon Musk would argue that in fact, they don't,
Speaker 2: you know, don't. I don't know exactly how that works
Speaker 2: in their brain, but like they seem to believe that
Speaker 2: like trans people aren't real.
Speaker 4: Right.
Speaker 2: You know, there was that law I think it was
Speaker 2: in I can't remember which state it was, but like
Speaker 2: an anti One of these laws that denied gender affirming
Speaker 2: care to trans kids was struck down by a judge
Speaker 2: somewhere in like the Deep South, I want to I'm
Speaker 2: not sure which, I can't remember which state it was.
Speaker 2: And the judge like explicitly said, and they're ruling that,
Speaker 2: you know, gender identity exists. It's a real thing. Like,
Speaker 2: despite all the vitriol and the huffing and puffing of
Speaker 2: these transphobes like Elon Musk, gender identity is real. They
Speaker 2: can pretend and perhaps wish that it weren't, but but
Speaker 2: it is.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that happened in Arkansas, and it kind of made
Speaker 1: me kind of cautiously optimistic that at a certain point,
Speaker 1: it doesn't matter if these extremists like it or get
Speaker 1: it or not. It's not their business, right, Like, gender exists.
Speaker 1: It's a thing that can shape people's lives. It's a
Speaker 1: thing that can determine what kind of medical care you
Speaker 1: need and what kind of care that you need to
Speaker 1: show up as your best self and your healthiest self.
Speaker 3: Even if transphobes and extremists don't like it, that is
Speaker 3: not their business.
Speaker 1: So that Arkansas ruling made me like cautiously optimistic that
Speaker 1: we can get to a place as like, Yeah.
Speaker 3: You don't have to like it. It's not your business.
Speaker 1: It's a real thing, and we need to make sure
Speaker 1: that people can get care that aligns with the care
Speaker 1: that they need. And it's really none of your business
Speaker 1: what that care is like. If you don't like it,
Speaker 1: fucking deal with it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely, I think Elon Musk has like a real
Speaker 2: problem with that, Right Like, he spent forty four billion
Speaker 2: dollars to buy Twitter so that he could be the
Speaker 2: guy who gets to decide what discourse is a loud
Speaker 2: and what discourse isn't hidden behind you know, his I
Speaker 2: don't know veneer of being a free speech champion, which
Speaker 2: he has revealed over and over again to just be
Speaker 2: a complete joke. Right Like, he's not in favor of
Speaker 2: free speech. He's in favor of the speech that he likes,
Speaker 2: and and speech that he doesn't like he wants to
Speaker 2: keep off of the platform. Right We've seen that a
Speaker 2: whole bunch of times. And now he's gone a step
Speaker 2: further to think that because he owns Twitter, he cannot
Speaker 2: only decide which speech is allowed and which speech isn't,
Speaker 2: but he can like invent new meanings for words, and
Speaker 2: he can't right, like, cis is not a slur, It's
Speaker 2: just a descriptive term to describe a phenomenon that exists
Speaker 2: in the natural world.
Speaker 1: Well, as awful as all of this is, and it
Speaker 1: is awful, at least it can be the final nail
Speaker 1: in the coffin of the idea that.
Speaker 3: Elon Musk is a free speech.
Speaker 1: Absolutist, as he has often hilariously claimed. He explicitly said
Speaker 1: when he bought Twitter, he was used it as a
Speaker 1: platform to try to police and restrict the language of
Speaker 1: trans people and people that support them, And it's I
Speaker 1: think part of a larger attempt to erase and eradicate
Speaker 1: transness and clearness from public and civic life.
Speaker 3: And so yeah, I think that's what he's doing.
Speaker 1: At least we've like dropped the conversation about how he's
Speaker 1: going to turn Twitter into a free speech utopia. At least,
Speaker 1: I mean, I haven't even seen anybody really say that,
Speaker 1: even any of his defenders say that, because it's so
Speaker 1: obviously not true that you can't even continue to say it,
Speaker 1: because it's like, well, look at all these examples of
Speaker 1: the ways that he hasn't done that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a good observation. I haven't heard anybody say
Speaker 2: that in a long time because it's like, obviously not true.
Speaker 2: It's not a free speech utopia. It's like an anti
Speaker 2: trans healthscape.
Speaker 3: An anti trans healthscape.
Speaker 1: Speaking of healthscapes, let's talk about the mess over at Reddit.
Speaker 1: So the Reddit blackout continues as thousands of subreddits remain private.
Speaker 1: Longtime volunteer moderators who have always been the backbone of
Speaker 1: Reddit and the communities that it hosts, have lots many
Speaker 1: popular subreddits in protest of the company's surprise decision to
Speaker 1: start charging third party apps and individuals for access to
Speaker 1: the platform's API. We've talked about this in an earlier
Speaker 1: news roundup, but previously API access has been free, which
Speaker 1: enabled the development of many third party apps that made
Speaker 1: Reddit easier to use, easier to moderate, and more accessible
Speaker 1: for Internet users with disabilities. But all of that ended
Speaker 1: earlier this month when Reddit shut down free access and
Speaker 1: started charging pretty steep fees for any app that used
Speaker 1: the API. In response, many major third party app developers
Speaker 1: said they would have to shut down their apps because
Speaker 1: they just simply could not afford the fees. Many of
Speaker 1: these apps were created by small indie developers who simply
Speaker 1: wanted to contribute to a better Internet with credit, not
Speaker 1: because they were particularly profitable. So this move by Reddit
Speaker 1: to consolidate and centralized power against the wishes of the
Speaker 1: army of volunteers who make the site an invaluable and
Speaker 1: fun resource, I think really represents like a dark trend
Speaker 1: on the Internet. I think it follows a similar move
Speaker 1: by Twitter shortly after Musk took over. Yep, this is
Speaker 1: the second and time we're talking about them. I'm sorry,
Speaker 1: but by shutting down free API access, Reddit and Twitter
Speaker 1: are actively making their platforms less friendly to their users.
Speaker 1: People use third party tools because those tools are useful.
Speaker 1: They didn't just start using them for fun. They use
Speaker 1: them for a reason. And now those tools are gone,
Speaker 1: so users are fewer options and reduced functionality for interacting
Speaker 1: with those platforms. And so I mean, I don't know,
Speaker 1: I don't know if this is like a boring story
Speaker 1: or not, but I really see it as a battle
Speaker 1: for the soul and the future of the Internet. One
Speaker 1: of the things that came up when we were talking
Speaker 1: about this, I think the week before last, was that
Speaker 1: how many people type when they have a question or
Speaker 1: they need some information, they'll type the question into Google
Speaker 1: and then they'll add Reddit because they want to get
Speaker 1: like real good information curated by a human. And I
Speaker 1: was just like, Oh, isn't that interesting? But then I
Speaker 1: thought about it more and I was like, well, why
Speaker 1: is that? And I think it's because we have just
Speaker 1: accepted that so much of our Internet infrastructure is scams.
Speaker 3: And ads an annoying.
Speaker 1: Post, Like, the experience of using the Internet in twenty
Speaker 1: twenty three is actually like an experience of wading through
Speaker 1: this minefield of scams and advertisements. And so the reason
Speaker 1: why people need to add Reddit to their Google search
Speaker 1: queries is because it was the only way to quickly
Speaker 1: get to information that was hand picked and looked at
Speaker 1: by a human and not some kind of a SEO
Speaker 1: bot scam. Right, Like, I don't know, And it's interesting
Speaker 1: to me that, Like, I think that this Reddit thing
Speaker 1: is really a conversation about what the Internet is for.
Speaker 3: Who it is for.
Speaker 1: Is it for humans who need accurate information or is
Speaker 1: it for bots and scammers and advertisers and seo hacks.
Speaker 3: Or something else?
Speaker 1: And so I think when we're thinking about this Reddit protest,
Speaker 1: I think it really like so goes Reddit, so goes
Speaker 1: the Internet. And I do think it's interesting that these
Speaker 1: Reddit moderators are not taking this lying down.
Speaker 3: If there's anything I know about Reddit.
Speaker 1: They are a vocal and passionate group of people. So
Speaker 1: you're seeing all of these kind of like roundabout protests
Speaker 1: where they were forced to when they went they took
Speaker 1: their subreddits private, and then they were kind of forced
Speaker 1: by Reddit to open them up, and so now they're
Speaker 1: finding all of these cheeky ways to continue that protest.
Speaker 1: Like a women's fashion subredit it's pretty big that I follow.
Speaker 1: They are now only posting fashion from like the seventeen
Speaker 1: hundreds as a way to sort of get around it.
Speaker 1: I think one of the large photo subreddits is now
Speaker 1: only posting pictures of John Oliver. So there's all these
Speaker 1: little ways of like sticking it to Reddit suits in
Speaker 1: forms of protests that I think have been really interesting.
Speaker 1: But it is not surprising to me that users are
Speaker 1: protesting this decision by Reddit top breasts because it's not good, right,
Speaker 1: It's not good because I think it makes the user
Speaker 1: experience worse, but also shutting down free API access also
Speaker 1: shuts out researchers researchers at universities, bank tanks, government agencies
Speaker 1: and other organizations have really relied for years on access
Speaker 1: to the back end of Twitter and red to be
Speaker 1: able to do research about what's going on on those platforms.
Speaker 1: That includes keeping tabs on things like disinformation trends, conspiracy theories,
Speaker 1: timely monitoring of new disinformation spreading online, analysis of the
Speaker 1: networks behind disinformation and harassment campaigns, as well as studies
Speaker 1: on political discourse, health issues, and a whole bunch of
Speaker 1: topics right like how people are having discourse on the
Speaker 1: Internet tells us so much about what's happening with us
Speaker 1: in the real world, what's happening to our government, what's
Speaker 1: happening in politics, what's happening in our Pacific world, and
Speaker 1: not allowing people who research and track and monitor trends
Speaker 1: in those arenas really puts us all at risk.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's actually personal for me because I have used
Speaker 2: both Twitter and Reddit's APIs in my own research in
Speaker 2: the past, and it's it's such a valuable resource for
Speaker 2: researchers to be able to look into what is going
Speaker 2: on on the Internet. And like you mentioned, there are
Speaker 2: some really like high stake things like monitoring disinformation ends.
Speaker 2: It's been used in violent conflicts to alert people to
Speaker 2: when there's like some sort of attack happening so that
Speaker 2: people can get out of that space. But there's also
Speaker 2: this huge number of studies that have been done about
Speaker 2: things that are like somewhat lower stakes but also valuable.
Speaker 2: For example, I was involved in a study a while
Speaker 2: ago that was looking at the subreddit quit vaping, And
Speaker 2: it was a subreddit of people who were trying to
Speaker 2: quit vaping, and so the researchers wanted to look at,
Speaker 2: like what were people saying, were they getting, were they
Speaker 2: exchanging accurate information? Were they was there like misinformation happening there?
Speaker 2: And you know, they found that for the most part,
Speaker 2: people were exchanging accurate information and social support and it
Speaker 2: was great. And so it's just like a nice little
Speaker 2: study that contributed to scientific understanding of how people give
Speaker 2: each other social support for health behavior change online. So
Speaker 2: like not super high stakes, but valuable information and also
Speaker 2: a really accessible way for young researchers and like grad
Speaker 2: students to do interesting, meaningful research without having a lot
Speaker 2: of funds. You know, often grad students get paid very little.
Speaker 2: They can often have little access to resources and so
Speaker 2: using these APIs was a valuable a way that they
Speaker 2: could do valuable research despite not having a lot of
Speaker 2: access to funds. And so now that these platforms are
Speaker 2: charging for access to these APIs, it's going to make
Speaker 2: it much harder, if not impossible, for a lot of
Speaker 2: that research to happen. And so these, you know, the
Speaker 2: army of grad students out there who really fuel a
Speaker 2: lot of the research that happens in this country and
Speaker 2: just across academia and across science, they are going to
Speaker 2: find other ways to do research in other areas, and
Speaker 2: so our visibility into what's happening on the Internet is
Speaker 2: going to be that much darker.
Speaker 1: Yeah, think about the grad students people. No, you're right,
Speaker 1: And I think like it comes down to a conversation
Speaker 1: that I keep returning to that I had with Paris
Speaker 1: Marx about who it is that is designing the future
Speaker 1: of the Internet for all of us, right, and like
Speaker 1: really look, really drilling down deep into who these people
Speaker 1: are and the internet and digital future that they want
Speaker 1: and that they're fighting for, and who benefits from that more.
Speaker 4: After a quick.
Speaker 5: Break, let's get right back into it.
Speaker 1: I saw this really interesting thing online about this series
Speaker 1: of I would say like not great interviews that Reddit
Speaker 1: CEO Steve Huffman gave to first The Verge and then
Speaker 1: NBC where he was like really praising Elon Musk and
Speaker 1: basically saying that the way that Elon Musk is running
Speaker 1: Twitter is like how he wants to run Reddit, he said,
Speaker 1: setting a good example of how he wants to run Reddit.
Speaker 1: We know that the way that Elon Musk has been
Speaker 1: running Twitter has been rampant layoffs, being pretty disrespectful to
Speaker 1: both users and staff.
Speaker 3: If that is what you see as.
Speaker 1: A role model for how you run a company, that
Speaker 1: is a big part of how the Internet functions and
Speaker 1: Internet discourse is, I think that we're all in trouble.
Speaker 1: Ben Collins at NBC called it CEO contagion, which I
Speaker 1: had never heard before and I thought was great. Where
Speaker 1: executives have effectively rebranded hostility to customers and cruel worker
Speaker 1: exploitation as being like Elon And apparently this phenomena is
Speaker 1: everywhere in tech company boardrooms right now, whether they're making
Speaker 1: it explicit like the Reddit CEO Seve Huffman is and
Speaker 1: these interviews, or if they're just like keeping their cards
Speaker 1: close to their chest saying like, yeah, we should start
Speaker 1: running our company the way that Elon Musk is. And
Speaker 1: I think you really have to call into question who
Speaker 1: these men are who have been given such outsized impact
Speaker 1: over the future of the Internet. Because the future of
Speaker 1: the Internet really matters. It matters for all of us.
Speaker 1: I have made this point so many times. What happens
Speaker 1: online deeply affects what happens in real life. That then
Speaker 1: dioram as a circle. And so when we give people
Speaker 1: like Steve Huffman and Elon Musk an outsized role in
Speaker 1: shaping the future of the Internet, we are giving them
Speaker 1: a role in shaping.
Speaker 3: The future of so much.
Speaker 1: And so it's really something that we've really got to
Speaker 1: keep an eye on.
Speaker 3: You know, this Reddit story. At first I thought it
Speaker 3: was kind of.
Speaker 1: A niche story, but I keep returning to it because
Speaker 1: I really deeply do think it is a battle for
Speaker 1: the future of the Internet and we should all be
Speaker 1: paying attention.
Speaker 2: Completely agree, I think that is exactly the right framing,
Speaker 2: Like who is the Internet for? Is it for these
Speaker 2: like rich CEO trolls like Elon Musk who just purchased
Speaker 2: this platform with money, or is it for the millions
Speaker 2: of redditors who have been construed beating content, moderating content,
Speaker 2: building community, maintaining community, uh for decades, right, like they
Speaker 2: the redditors built reddit, right, like Steve Huffman did not.
Speaker 2: It's maddening and like you say, it's it's dangerous because
Speaker 2: they Yeah, in those interviews, Steve Huffman was, you know,
Speaker 2: praising Elon Musk and these you know, actions of disrespect.
Speaker 2: And I think disrespect is the perfect word to characterize
Speaker 2: this attitude towards users, towards workers. And if that's where
Speaker 2: he's coming from, what kind of product is going to
Speaker 2: grow out of that?
Speaker 5: Uh?
Speaker 2: Not a good one. Not a good internet that serves
Speaker 2: the needs of the population, and you know, makes people
Speaker 2: feel safe and valued and want to show up.
Speaker 1: So you mentioned internet trolls earlier, and we kind of
Speaker 1: have to talk about RFK Junior on Joe Rogan. I
Speaker 1: don't really want to, but let's just step into it anyway.
Speaker 1: So anti VAX's conspiracy theorist and presidential candidate Robert F.
Speaker 1: Kennedy Junior did a three and a half hour stint
Speaker 1: on Joe Rogan's Spotify original podcast last week, and the
Speaker 1: results were not great. First of all as a podcaster
Speaker 1: three and a half hours, I can't kidding me.
Speaker 3: Ever heard of a fucking editor?
Speaker 2: I hope our listeners don't expect the three and a
Speaker 2: half hour episode because that's just like not happening. I don't.
Speaker 2: Part of me is like amazed and impressed by it,
Speaker 2: but part of me is like, that's just like so
Speaker 2: much time, Like, don't they have other things they need
Speaker 2: to do?
Speaker 4: Maybe not? I guess, I guess not.
Speaker 2: I guess this is what they do.
Speaker 4: Ugh.
Speaker 1: I mean, I feel uncomfortable when I put out an
Speaker 1: episode's that goes over an hour. I'm like, oh, were
Speaker 1: really getting into rogan territory? Like, yeah, three hours?
Speaker 3: That is a marathon.
Speaker 1: So on the show, RFK talked about the usual conspiracy
Speaker 1: theories about vaccines, five g wi FI and illnesses that.
Speaker 3: Have been debunked long ago.
Speaker 1: I honestly don't want to list them all here, but
Speaker 1: if you want to know, if you want to know
Speaker 1: what specific conspiracy theories these people trafficked in, Anna Merlin
Speaker 1: has a great breakdown advice which will link in the
Speaker 1: show notes. She called the episode quote an orgy of
Speaker 1: unchecked vaccine misinformation, some conspiracy mongering about five G technology
Speaker 1: and Wi Fi, and of course broke in once again
Speaker 1: praising ivormetrin and ineffective faux COVID treatment. So I love
Speaker 1: the idea. I love the phrase an orgy of unchecked misinformation.
Speaker 1: That's exactly what it is. Honestly, this stuff is just
Speaker 1: so boring. When I was going to, you know, write
Speaker 1: my outline for this bit of the show, I was like,
Speaker 1: we are just talking about rehashing stuff that we have,
Speaker 1: like has been done to death. The whole thing just
Speaker 1: feels very twenty twenty one. Like I was like, we're
Speaker 1: getting into vaccine misinformation again again. We're talking about I'm
Speaker 1: a metrin again, Like didn't we do that? It just
Speaker 1: feels very like early pandemic twenty twenty one. Merlin asked
Speaker 1: Spotify if they were going to take the episode down
Speaker 1: to align with their COVID misinformation policy. They basically kind
Speaker 1: of danced around it again. You can read their response
Speaker 1: on the vice piece. You know, folks might remember that
Speaker 1: there was a whole conversation about Joe Rogan and misinformation
Speaker 1: when Neil Young and others removed their content from Spotify
Speaker 1: to protest him continuing to traffic in misinformation.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it just feels like we're here again.
Speaker 1: Like I don't just feel I feel like this is
Speaker 1: like a real Groundhog Day of a story where it's like, oh,
Speaker 1: he's doing it again. Oh they're asking Spotify again, and
Speaker 1: they're like giving pr nothing speak and doing nothing.
Speaker 3: So basically, here's where it gets kind of interesting.
Speaker 1: When an actual doctor, Peter Hoats, a vaccine scientist at
Speaker 1: Baylor College of Medicine, took to Twitter to rebut ourfk's
Speaker 1: claims about vaccines, Joe Rogan replied by inviting the doctor
Speaker 1: to come on the podcast and debate our FK. The
Speaker 1: doctor declined, and he said, I'll come on for like
Speaker 1: a one on one conversation or an interview, but I'm
Speaker 1: not doing a debate. Then, of course, Elon Musk, I'm sorry,
Speaker 1: this is the third time we've mentioned him. Had to
Speaker 1: get his two cents in, had to butt in because
Speaker 1: Joe Rogan RFK Elon Musk, They're all like, like, we
Speaker 1: need a word for that group of people, like you
Speaker 1: know what I mean, Like we don't have a we
Speaker 1: don't have a good word for them.
Speaker 3: We need a word for them. But because his buddy
Speaker 3: Joe Rogan was getting into it. Elon Musk.
Speaker 1: Of course he had to get his two cents in,
Speaker 1: and he said that this doctor was just afraid of
Speaker 1: open debate because he knew that he would lose, so
Speaker 1: rather unfortunately, this doctor said that the whole thing ended
Speaker 1: with two people showing up outside of his house urging
Speaker 1: him to debate Joe Rogan, which like this is like
Speaker 1: I can't wrap my.
Speaker 3: Head around this.
Speaker 1: Can you imagine not one, but two people getting into
Speaker 1: their car, like taking off work whatever they got to do,
Speaker 1: getting a babysitter, getting in their car, searching this guy's address,
Speaker 1: driving to his house, standing outside out of his house,
Speaker 1: making a nuisance of themselves in the name of defending
Speaker 1: the honor of Joe Rogan. Like, I can't even wrap
Speaker 1: my head around the kind of person who does this.
Speaker 2: We do need a name for these people. Maybe our
Speaker 2: listeners can suggest one. Either they could like connect with
Speaker 2: you on social or you know, write in on email
Speaker 2: Hello at tangoty dot com. I'd love to hear some ideas.
Speaker 2: I feel like some form of jock should be in
Speaker 2: the name, because there's like a very like internet jock
Speaker 2: or like social media jock or something. I don't know
Speaker 2: these I'm not good at coming up with names. But
Speaker 2: like the whole this whole thing feels very like Sportsey,
Speaker 2: you know, the idea that this doctor is afraid to
Speaker 2: debate because he'll he knows it, he'll lose. Like this
Speaker 2: guy is a he's a doctor, he's a he's a scientist, right,
Speaker 2: He's trained to use science to learn the truth about
Speaker 2: viruses is and how they impact the human body. He's
Speaker 2: not trained in getting on the mic and having like
Speaker 2: a debate on a podcast. That is a completely different
Speaker 2: skill set, and it also has you know, winning a
Speaker 2: debate like that has very little to do with the
Speaker 2: actual truth of the thing. Right. It's like we live
Speaker 2: in two different worlds from these people, where some of
Speaker 2: us are interested in what is the truth about the
Speaker 2: world and the COVID virus and how it affects our
Speaker 2: bodies and things we can do to protect our bodies
Speaker 2: from being harmed by it, and other people live in
Speaker 2: a world where it's all just made up talking points,
Speaker 2: where there is no truth, and scoring points and winning
Speaker 2: the debate and getting clicks is the only thing that matters.
Speaker 2: And I don't know how we like talk with them.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's a great this doctor should not I mean,
Speaker 1: he was absolutely right to decline the invitation to debate
Speaker 1: Joe Rogan and RFK. You know, if rfk's vaccine misinformation
Speaker 1: felt very twenty twenty one, the whole like debate me
Speaker 1: bro thing feels like very twenty ten. It's just so
Speaker 1: tired and boring. If anybody ever challenges you to a
Speaker 1: public debate in twenty twenty three, you should decline on
Speaker 1: principle alone. And I really like this tweet from the
Speaker 1: Guardian's Hamilton Nolan about this. He said, I know you
Speaker 1: did a PhD and wrote a book on this very
Speaker 1: complex topic, but if you don't debate my horse on
Speaker 1: stage at the county Fair, why should I believe you?
Speaker 1: My horse can clamp his hoof once for yes and
Speaker 1: twice for no. And doesn't that really illustrated? I mean,
Speaker 1: I think like in a lot of ways, we are
Speaker 1: in this era that is kind of beyond facts and
Speaker 1: beyond credentials, and there is no point in debating somebody
Speaker 1: who you cannot find a shared understanding of the facts, right, Like,
Speaker 1: it's not going to be a worthy enterprise. It is
Speaker 1: not to be something that is going to be it's
Speaker 1: gonna serve anybody or make anybody smarter by watching two people,
Speaker 1: one of whom is a credentialed scientist in this and
Speaker 1: the other is Joe fucking Rogan, who is completely making.
Speaker 3: Up his own facts.
Speaker 1: And any kind of like institutional fact that you have
Speaker 1: is just going to be discounted because like, oh it
Speaker 1: came from the mainstream media. Oh, but it came from
Speaker 1: big Farmer or whatever. Like this doctor is a vaccine specialist.
Speaker 1: He went to school, he has credentials. It's one thing
Speaker 1: to do a sit down interview about vaccines, you know,
Speaker 1: on the show. It's quite another to be debating somebody
Speaker 1: like RFK is an attorney, this guy is a doctor.
Speaker 1: And since when is a debate on a podcast hosted
Speaker 1: by a former news radio series regular the way that
Speaker 1: medical facts are established?
Speaker 3: You know?
Speaker 1: This is one of those things that like, when I
Speaker 1: was watching the Discourse unfold, it was getting me so
Speaker 1: angry that I was like, I can't even pay attention
Speaker 1: to this.
Speaker 3: I saw somebody on Twitter.
Speaker 1: Say, oh, well, really easy to get on your high
Speaker 1: horse and hide behind your credentials.
Speaker 3: And literally people.
Speaker 1: Go to school and contribute to academia and research and
Speaker 1: get credentials because they want to have expertise on stuff.
Speaker 3: That is literally how it works.
Speaker 1: Just attacking somebody because they happen to be an expert
Speaker 1: just really goes to show how we're in this space
Speaker 1: where to a lot of people, facts don't matter, reality
Speaker 1: doesn't matter, expertise doesn't matter, and in fact it's to
Speaker 1: be suspect of and that the only thing that matters
Speaker 1: is talking points and one upsmanship and clicks and engagement.
Speaker 1: And that is why people like RFK, people like Elon Musk,
Speaker 1: people like Joe Rogan do it.
Speaker 3: It is a grift. It makes them money.
Speaker 1: It makes this poor doctor, you know, have people show
Speaker 1: up at his house in the middle of the night,
Speaker 1: which is already unacceptable. This is why they do it,
Speaker 1: don't I don't actually think they are serious. I think
Speaker 1: they do it because they know it is a grift
Speaker 1: and that there's a certain type of person who's always
Speaker 1: going to be like, wow, they're really going against the grain,
Speaker 1: they're really think for themselves, and they're always going to
Speaker 1: give that more engagement.
Speaker 3: It is just aggristed, it really is.
Speaker 2: And the fact that they're still talking about invermectin that
Speaker 2: like horse medicine that they for some reason thought was
Speaker 2: a covid antidote. That really gives lie to the whole thing, right, Like,
Speaker 2: if they just had vaccine skepticism, I don't think it's
Speaker 2: justified in twenty twenty three, But like, okay, you have
Speaker 2: some skepticism about this or that, fine, But the fact
Speaker 2: that they're still talking about this invermectin as a covid
Speaker 2: cure when there's zero evidence for it. It's been thoroughly debunked.
Speaker 2: To the extent that you can debunk something that like
Speaker 2: never had any evidence in the first place, is just
Speaker 2: proof of how disingenuous they are and how insincere they
Speaker 2: are about any curiosity about this, Right, Like, the most
Speaker 2: cursory Internet search of, like, okay, what is the the
Speaker 2: evidence that supports ivermectin would turn up the fact that
Speaker 2: there is nothing, There is no evidence to support that.
Speaker 2: It's just a complete fabrication, and yet they still continue
Speaker 2: to repeat it. If they were sincerely interested in these questions,
Speaker 2: they would find some answers, and the answers are easy
Speaker 2: to find, but they're just not interested in that. They're
Speaker 2: interested in the theater.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's one of the things that really gets me
Speaker 1: about this story is that it's things that I feel
Speaker 1: like have been pretty well settled.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 1: This is that that is not a cure for COVID.
Speaker 1: You should not like I have a metron is not
Speaker 1: a cure for COVID. And then he also went back
Speaker 1: to the idea that vaccines cause autism, which thank you
Speaker 1: Jenny mccarsony for, you know, really getting that into the ecosphere.
Speaker 1: But I think continuing to return to these thoroughly debunked
Speaker 1: conspiracy theories about health is something that really gets me.
Speaker 1: And also there's something about RFK and and maybe sid
Speaker 1: Joe Rogan to a lessous extent, but I think to
Speaker 1: people on the left who should know better, I think
Speaker 1: is kind of attractive. And so I think one of
Speaker 1: the reasons why I find this whole thing so upsetting
Speaker 1: is that I have seen folks on the left who
Speaker 1: should know better parenting this, amplifying this, saying things like, oh,
Speaker 1: he makes some compelling points, but it's like, no, he's
Speaker 1: making points that have been thoroughly debunked. If you just
Speaker 1: did a Google search, it's not compelling points. And so
Speaker 1: I'm concerned that the same way that people allowed Trump
Speaker 1: to spew nonsense and conspiracy theories, and rather than calling
Speaker 1: them out, they said, like, oh, well, he is asking
Speaker 1: some questions, or like he is saying what people think,
Speaker 1: or any number of things excusing things that he would say.
Speaker 1: I worry that we have learned nothing and we're going
Speaker 1: to be doing the exact same thing in this upcoming
Speaker 1: presidential election as well.
Speaker 4: After a quick break, let's get right back into it.
Speaker 1: Let's talk about the Grammys, where they've determined that the
Speaker 1: Grammys are for humans only kind of. The Recording Academy,
Speaker 1: which is the organization behind the Grammy Awards, outlined brand
Speaker 1: new rules ahead of next year's competition, one that states
Speaker 1: outrights that only human creators are eligible for the music
Speaker 1: industry's highest honors. It's a little bit tricky, but basically,
Speaker 1: songs generated by AI can still be nominated, but there
Speaker 1: has to be proof that a human meaningfully contributed to
Speaker 1: the song too. So if there's an AI voice singing
Speaker 1: a song or AI instrumentation, they might consider it. This
Speaker 1: is what Harvey Mason Junior, the CEO of the Recording Academy,
Speaker 1: told Grammy dot Com. But in songwriting based categories, it
Speaker 1: has to have been written mostly by a human. I
Speaker 1: do have some questions about what things like mostly or
Speaker 1: you know, a human meaningfully contributing to a song really means,
Speaker 1: Like it seems like there's some room to be defined there.
Speaker 1: But ultimately, I think it's probably a good thing that
Speaker 1: the Recording Academy is putting some guardrails in place to
Speaker 1: deal with what I imagine will probably become an inevitability in
Speaker 1: music and songwriting that more and more human artists are
Speaker 1: going to be collaborating with AI.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I think they should be commended for attempting to get
Speaker 2: in front of this and for prioritizing humans. But man,
Speaker 2: I think we are all headed towards a lot of
Speaker 2: questions about what does it mean for a human to
Speaker 2: have meaningfully created something versus that human using AI as
Speaker 2: a tool to create something, Like I guess like the
Speaker 2: nature of what it means to create something is going
Speaker 2: to be something a topic that we all have to
Speaker 2: start talking about, and I suspect there's going to be
Speaker 2: very thorny answers.
Speaker 1: We're actually doing an episode about AI and the creative arts.
Speaker 1: We're going to be talking to a screenwriter and a
Speaker 1: creative about the WGA strike and how AI plays into
Speaker 1: all of it. I do think that, you know, when
Speaker 1: you look at what screenwriters are asking for when it
Speaker 1: comes to AI, they want to ensure that AI is
Speaker 1: only going to be used to like supplement a human's
Speaker 1: creative writing process and not be generating the entire thing.
Speaker 3: And so I do think that it is commendable that the.
Speaker 1: Grammys are drawing a line in the stand and saying no,
Speaker 1: this is how a human needs to be involved in
Speaker 1: the process if AI is involved. But I do think,
Speaker 1: like you said, like it is a question of what
Speaker 1: this is going to look like, Like.
Speaker 3: I don't know. I don't want to see an all
Speaker 3: robot Grammys.
Speaker 1: When I watch the Grammys, I want to see Gloria
Speaker 1: Estefan and Celine Dion.
Speaker 3: I don't want to see a bunch of robots. So
Speaker 3: we'll see. Yeah.
Speaker 2: If you think about great music over the past, you know,
Speaker 2: like forever, it's always been something new, something transformational, somebody
Speaker 2: who either crosses genres or invents something entirely new. And
Speaker 2: AI can't do that, right Like, AI puts out patterns
Speaker 2: based on what it's learned from what has already seen.
Speaker 2: So I think, on the one hand, there's always going
Speaker 2: to be a place for human creativity to come up
Speaker 2: with new things that are transformational and change. And it's
Speaker 2: just a big open question how AI is going to
Speaker 2: show up in music, but it seems pretty likely that
Speaker 2: it's definitely going to be there in some form.
Speaker 1: This reminds me so much of the very first interview
Speaker 1: we ever did on this podcast with Claire Evans, who
Speaker 1: is so cool. She's one of my idols. She wrote
Speaker 1: the book Broadband about how women contributed to computers from
Speaker 1: the very beginning, and she's in the pop group Yacht
Speaker 1: And one of the things that she talked about is
Speaker 1: how in the eighties, when dj and musicians were using
Speaker 1: things like drum machines and sampling to come up with
Speaker 1: the genre that would then be called hip hop, there
Speaker 1: was a time where some DJs were afraid that drum
Speaker 1: machines and samplers were going to replace them, and that
Speaker 1: it was the musicians who learned how to combine their
Speaker 1: human talents with that technology to make a whole new genre.
Speaker 1: Those were the ones who really thrived and did something cool.
Speaker 1: And so I don't want to make it seem like I'm,
Speaker 1: you know, an AI doom and Gloomer. I think that
Speaker 1: there are going to be use cases in the creative
Speaker 1: arts where AI can probably be a useful supplement to
Speaker 1: a human in a studio, or to a human who
Speaker 1: is writing something, or to a human who is making
Speaker 1: some sort of music. But I worry that in a
Speaker 1: society where we are so interested in exploiting and mining
Speaker 1: and taking for capital, I worry that it will something
Speaker 1: that probably does have a use case for creativity and
Speaker 1: creating an entirely new cool thing that that like does
Speaker 1: need a human knowing how to use this technology to do.
Speaker 3: I worry that we're.
Speaker 1: Just going to rely on exactly what you just described, right,
Speaker 1: just like, how can we just recycle something that already
Speaker 1: exists to make.
Speaker 3: More crap that is derivative?
Speaker 1: And I really worry that that's what the use case
Speaker 1: is going to be. How can we make cheaper and
Speaker 1: cheaper art. How can we, you know, continue to put
Speaker 1: the squeeze on the humans that make that art in
Speaker 1: favor of making worse and more derivative art that costs
Speaker 1: us less money while continuing to generate capital. So I
Speaker 1: think it's kind of a TBD how it looks down
Speaker 1: the road. What the future of this technology looks like
Speaker 1: for creative work. But I do think it is important
Speaker 1: to be putting some early guardrails in place now, and
Speaker 1: so I guess it seems like that's what the Recording
Speaker 1: Academy is trying to do.
Speaker 2: Yeah, guardrails and also a statement of values, right that
Speaker 2: it is human creativity that the Academy wants to celebrate.
Speaker 1: So speaking of celebrate, I have a little bit of
Speaker 1: good news. Illinois became the first state in the United
Speaker 1: States to ban book bans in public libraries. Illinois Governor J. B.
Speaker 1: Pritzker signed a bill to ban public libraries from banning books,
Speaker 1: the first such legislation in the country. He said, book
Speaker 1: bans are about censorship, marginalizing people, marginalizing ideas, and marginalizing facts.
Speaker 1: Regimes banned books, not democracies. This is what he said
Speaker 1: out of assigning ceremony at Chicago Public Library. We refuse
Speaker 1: to let a vitriolic strain of white nationalism coursing through
Speaker 1: our country determine whose histories are told, not.
Speaker 3: In Illinois, which kudos to him.
Speaker 1: This new legislation takes place on January first, and it
Speaker 1: says that public libraries must adopt the American Library Association's
Speaker 1: Library Bill of Rights or their own statement prohibiting book
Speaker 1: banning to be eligible for any state money. The Association's
Speaker 1: Library Bill of Rights states that reading materials should not
Speaker 1: be prescribed or removed because of partisan roductional disapproval, or
Speaker 1: excluded because of the origin, background, or views of those
Speaker 1: contributing to their creation. And so it kind of goes
Speaker 1: back to what I was saying earlier about the Arkansas thing.
Speaker 1: This might be cautiously optimistic, and I'm kind of I
Speaker 1: want to choose my words carefully here, but I do wonder,
Speaker 1: slash hope if this is a signal that the extremists
Speaker 1: who are trying to use marginalized people as a wedge
Speaker 1: issue are losing, and they know they are losing because
Speaker 1: people don't want this. In a democracy, people don't want
Speaker 1: books banned from public libraries, books about marginalized people. People
Speaker 1: want books about marginalized people. People are buying those books
Speaker 1: are flying off the shelves, as we talked about in
Speaker 1: one of our earlier newscasts. People don't want this. And
Speaker 1: I'm cautiously optimistic that this is a sign that the
Speaker 1: extremists who are pushing this this very small but vocal
Speaker 1: number of extremists know that they are losing and know
Speaker 1: that the rest of the public is not on their side.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I hope you're right in that optimism, because it does
Speaker 2: seem like the extremes is the right word here, right.
Speaker 2: The people pushing for these book bands are not middle
Speaker 2: of the road Republicans who are trying to win elections.
Speaker 2: They are extremists with an extreme agenda. Whether it's anti gay,
Speaker 2: anti trans, anti sex, just straight out to lunch, it's
Speaker 2: extreme extremists. And for years, I think relatively moderate politicians
Speaker 2: on the right we're more than happy to pander to
Speaker 2: these extremists to get their votes. And I am also
Speaker 2: cautiously optimistic that the bill is coming due and it's
Speaker 2: catching up to them about issues like these book bans.
Speaker 2: I think abortion is another issue where they are realizing
Speaker 2: that by catering to these extreme extremists who are so
Speaker 2: out of step with what the general population wants, it's
Speaker 2: a losing recipe electorally.
Speaker 5: Uh.
Speaker 2: And I hope that continues.
Speaker 1: A point that I make all the time as somebody
Speaker 1: who thinks about and studies disinformation, is that the reason
Speaker 1: why I know these extremists are losing, and aware that
Speaker 1: that they're aware that they're losing is that they lie.
Speaker 1: If they had positions that were popular, that people agreed
Speaker 1: with and liked, they would not have to lie. So
Speaker 1: when extremists like the people who run the organization Moms
Speaker 1: for Liberty, you know who, by the way, just used
Speaker 1: a Hitler quote in their flyer recently, so like pretty
Speaker 1: like saying a loud part loud when they lie about
Speaker 1: the kind of books and the content of these books.
Speaker 1: When extremists lie and say that target is selling you know,
Speaker 1: chess binders for toddlers, or took friendly swimsuits for toddlers,
Speaker 1: or shirts for children that have Satan on them, which
Speaker 1: they're doing, no such thing. When anti abortion extremists lie
Speaker 1: about their positions on abortion and they say, oh, this
Speaker 1: is just leaving them up to the states, we're not
Speaker 1: actually banning abortion, or oh like this is actually quite moderate,
Speaker 1: that's all lies. When they lie, it is because they
Speaker 1: know their positions are not popular. If they were popular,
Speaker 1: if people agreed with them, they wouldn't have.
Speaker 3: To lie to get people on board.
Speaker 1: And so I think it really I'm cautiously optimistic that
Speaker 1: people are waking up. They're saying, Oh, these people, the
Speaker 1: things that they're that they're the positioning as you know,
Speaker 1: just them moderately asking questions about society and trying to
Speaker 1: protect kids or whatever lie they're telling.
Speaker 3: I think that people are waking up to the.
Speaker 1: Fact that that is bs and that that doesn't move
Speaker 1: people right. I think that we also, for too long,
Speaker 1: have had a media climate that is too afraid to
Speaker 1: talk about these issues for what they are. We saw
Speaker 1: the whole thing with the critical race theory panic, where
Speaker 1: the mainstream media was all too happy to do the
Speaker 1: dirty work of extremists for them by lending credence to
Speaker 1: the ideas that, yeah, kindergarteners are being taught critical race theory,
Speaker 1: this high minded.
Speaker 3: Collegiate level, you know, idea. When they weren't.
Speaker 1: They were way too happy to make it seem like, oh,
Speaker 1: these are just parents concerned about things like bathroom bills
Speaker 1: and you know, protecting girls in sports. And now I
Speaker 1: think that all of that stuff is coming home to
Speaker 1: russ and I hope that people remember this come election
Speaker 1: time that I don't think that your average American is
Speaker 1: moved by this. I don't think that your average American
Speaker 1: walks around on their day to day being really outraged
Speaker 1: about what Target is selling or what books about LGBTQ
Speaker 1: people or black people are in their libraries. I really don't,
Speaker 1: and so I'm cautiously optimistic that come November we will
Speaker 1: see that come to fruition. So one last thing, we
Speaker 1: got to quickly talk about this, Zuckerberg, Elon Musk, what
Speaker 1: is this the fourth time you've brought him up? I'm
Speaker 1: so sorry, so Musk heavy episode this cage match that
Speaker 1: they're talking about. So Elon Musk recently tweeted that he
Speaker 1: would be up for a cage fight with Facebook meta
Speaker 1: CEO Mark Zuckerberg. Zuckerberg shot back with an image of
Speaker 1: Musk's tweet with the caption send me your locations. It
Speaker 1: sounds like these two heads of major tech companies intend
Speaker 1: to have some kind of a cage match, physical fight.
Speaker 1: And all I have to say about this is that
Speaker 1: this is what happens when men run tech companies. And
Speaker 1: that's all I have to say about that. I do
Speaker 1: have one more thing I want to talk about. I'm
Speaker 1: sure folks by now have seen the Ocean Gate tragedy
Speaker 1: where a billionaire and his kid and other folks went
Speaker 1: down to check out the ruins of the Titanic and
Speaker 1: did not make it. There have been so many conspiracy
Speaker 1: theories around how folks are talking about this tragedy and
Speaker 1: a really interesting Q question mark online discourse. So I
Speaker 1: want to talk about this, but this story is everywhere,
Speaker 1: so I'm going to save it for the Patreon. So
Speaker 1: if you want to hear my thoughts about the Ocean
Speaker 1: Gate tragedy, what conspiracy theories are sort of taking root,
Speaker 1: because some of them are quite interesting. What conspiracy theories
Speaker 1: are taking root about how folks are talking about this
Speaker 1: and the online discourse around this tragedy and how folks
Speaker 1: were talking about it. Check out our patreon. You can
Speaker 1: check out at patreon dot com slash Tangody. I would
Speaker 1: love to have that conversation with you there, Mike. Thank
Speaker 1: you so much for being here as always.
Speaker 2: Thanks for having me Bridget, it was a pleasure, and.
Speaker 1: Thanks so much for listening again. You can check out
Speaker 1: our patreon from our ad free content and to support
Speaker 1: the show and I'll see you soon. Got a story
Speaker 1: about an interesting thing in tech, or just want to
Speaker 1: say hi, You can reach us at Hello at Tegody
Speaker 1: dot com. You can also find transcripts for today's episode
Speaker 1: at tengody dot com. There Are No Girls on the
Speaker 1: Internet was created by me Bridget Todd. It's a production
Speaker 1: of iHeartRadio and Unbossed creative Jonathan Strickland as our executive producer.
Speaker 1: Tari Harrison is our producer and sound engineer. Michael Amado
Speaker 1: is our contributing producer. I'm your host, Bridget Todd. If
Speaker 1: you want to help us grow, rate and review us
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