Supreme Court Saves Social Media, Montana Bans TikTok, and Sam Altman Wants AI Regulation

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Hi, everyone.

This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network, and I am Christiane Amanpour.

Actually, we all are.

She gave a great speech, Scott.

But hello, how are you doing?

Okay, say more.

She gave an amazing commencement address at the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism, where I went.

And she works for CNN.

She's a very well-known CNN person.

And she actually went against CNN.

And she said she had spoken to Chris Licht and then gave a stem winder of a speech where she said a lot of stuff, a lot of really interesting stuff, which I obviously agree with.

It was elegant and also eviscerating at the same time.

One of the things she said that really struck me is: be truthful, but not neutral.

Both sidesism does not get you to the truth.

Drawing false and moral factual or factual equivalents is neither objective or truthful.

And she sort of schooled CNN on some stuff.

You know,

she's just the kind of person they say they want who's super, you know, delivers the news.

And she isn't, you don't ever think of her as a pundit in any way.

And she sort of handed them their hats.

It was quite something to see.

They knew she was going to do it.

She told them.

I don't think they have much control over her

or she wouldn't really listen to them.

So anyway, it was an interesting speech and I applaud her for it.

Thank you.

My most viral video clip of 2023 is when I was on with Christiana.

I like her.

She's an impressive woman.

Well, just as it's great to live in America where you can shitpost America nonstop, but if someone asks you about Turkey or China, you become very thoughtful and measured because you're a total prostitute for money and you're very, you're a truth teller in democratic free speech environments.

And then you become, you know, I'm, of course, talking about Musk.

It's great to work for CNN where they, where they say to the reporters, we respect your rights to say what you want to say off camera versus working at Fox.

Not everybody.

I didn't like Oliver Darcy's news.

What?

Because he went on background with you and bitched about a bad meeting?

No, he did not.

He did not.

I didn't write one story about it.

By the way, I haven't had breakfast.

I'm hangry.

I see that.

I didn't write one story on this company, but nonetheless, I'm sure they're not happy that she did this one.

She has a higher status.

Like, I can say things that maybe others at Fox can't say.

Oh, and also,

I'm getting calls from my lesbian friends saying, you really don't know how lesbians have children from our last episode.

I know.

Many people were surprised by that.

And by the way, I just want to point out, I absolutely don't understand how it happens.

This is how it happens.

Oh, Scott.

We're We're moving on to lesbianism.

I'm going to finish with Christiana Monaporse.

She's a real hero.

I thought she elegantly did it.

These are people she works for.

She obviously has greater status, so can say more than other people at the company who are not allowed.

There's a real, I know you don't think it's a big deal, but there is a real.

groundswell of upset within that company.

And I think she articulated it with a lot of

class.

You know what I mean?

Like, and I think that's a great thing.

I think all news organizations have to get used to being covered themselves, including being talked about by the people who work there.

And there's this old school idea that you're not supposed to talk about the place you work.

And I think that's bullshit because, you know, you have to, it's a media organization.

It's not, you're not working for Exxon or whoever.

And so I think that she, as usual, met my already high expectations, doing a classy dissent and in a really great way.

I know inside of CNN, it's much appreciated because she has a lot of status and can do these things while others get slapped down.

In any case, well done, Christiane.

And Scott, if you have any questions about lesbian procreation, why don't you proceed?

So they literally called and said, you really don't understand how lesbians have children.

I'm like, of course I do.

You guys cry and hug for several hours as Riverdale plays in the background and a German shepherd pulls up in a Subaru and delivers a baby.

Oh my God.

How can I be so wrong yet so

God?

I'm not even going to tell you.

I don't even imagine.

Oh good God.

We go to the doctor's office.

We go to the doctor's office and get inseminated.

That is how it happens.

As you know, I've told this story before.

I happened to be on the phone with Walt Mossberg while I was undergoing the procedure.

Yeah, I was.

I was in my age and Walt's age.

A lot of procedures.

Let me just say, if that ever happened, I would not be.

talking to you during such a procedure.

Walt, I trust you wouldn't be making rude jokes throughout any kind of insemination procedure.

Thank you.

So there you go.

So just so you know, I do make jokes during insemination procedures.

And it doesn't work.

Just so you know.

If I don't bring some humor to me during that situation,

it's a disturbing experience.

I'm trying to start this morning on an elegant way with Christiane Amancour, and you take it right down to lesbian procreate.

All right, whatever.

We're going to move on.

We're going to move on.

You're in Miami.

You and your virtue signaling around how much you like Christian

Why don't you just

not be a cynic about someone who's doing something great?

Just say, God, that was cool.

She's doing great work.

Anyway, we have a lot to talk about.

The CEO of OpenA says he wants Congress to regulate artificial intelligence.

We'll get into that.

I know you had a little tweet situation on the whole thing.

Also, the U.S.

state bans, TikTok outright, shocker.

It's a GOP state.

And we'll unpack some of Elon Musk's latest failings.

But first, the Supreme Court has punted on its Section 230 decision, like we said, Scott, in the case of Gonzalez versus Google.

The one about the family whose daughter was killed by ISIS in Paris, the court sent a decision back down to the lower court, punting.

Another related case, Twitter versus Tamna, the court ruled unanimously that Twitter did not provide assistance to ISIS.

In that case, the family lost someone in an ISIS attack in Istanbul.

The rulings are being called a win for social media companies because they are.

We predicted they would not touch this thing.

The courts are not going to be

social media regulating nor should they in this case.

And Congress, of course, does nothing.

So where does that leave things, Scott?

Leaves them where they are.

And

it's really interesting.

Well, I don't know.

Can you think of another body right now that has lost more credibility this quickly than the Supreme Court?

No.

No.

In this case, I think they made the right decision.

I agree.

I agree.

No,

I think, like I said,

I know.

We should just give Clarence Thomas a million dollars to stop being so corrupt.

Just get in here.

Just you need the money.

Well, actually, it's an interesting point.

And that is, should we be paying, and I think there's, I think this is worth exploring.

I wonder if we should be paying our elected officials a lot more money.

And because I think a lot of them

are prone to

raise money, maybe the Supreme Court or regulators.

Well, the Supreme Court also, but I do think a lot of these

a lot of elected officials have their eye on the the the paid positions and jobs prize yeah and i think it's unhealthy i think it ends up perverting their decision-making and there's something to be said for i mean sent we had senator warner on senator warner can't be bought yeah he's you know and i'm not suggesting we only have rich people in congress but there's something about maybe paying these people more that i think warrants consideration

well in any case any thoughts on these i think this was not the appropriate place for these decisions and they were not correct you cannot hold them accountable this is not how, you know what?

Change Section 230 if you don't believe it.

Like legislate, rewrite it.

230 is the law.

They interpreted 230 correctly.

And so

I just don't know what, I can't imagine the precedents it would set in the number of cases that we filed the next day.

Go ahead.

If a tourist in Paris, which is a tragedy, who is killed by ISIS, is somehow they find Twitter liable for that.

Yeah, that was Google.

That was Google.

Oh, it was Google, excuse me.

But that to me just, okay, now what?

Right?

So, yeah, I agree with you.

I think they got this right.

I don't mind that they brought it and tested it, but it just seemed like this is not what the law says.

Again, change the law.

The problem is not the Supreme Court here, although the school project has become a massive problem, I think, in terms of their ethics and standards.

But this is Congress's job.

This is Congress's job.

This is Congress's job, as with most things.

And they can either do it around this or AI or anything else, or they can not and then reap the whirlwind, which they have reaped.

Anyway, there's a new group leading negotiations over the debt ceiling, and it's inspiring confidence across parties that the deal might happen.

The White House has called on its counselor, Steve Roschetti, Budget Chief, Shalanda Young, and Legislative Affairs Chief Louisa Terrell.

Republicans are sending Representative Garrett Graves to negotiate.

He has a pretty good reputation.

Richetti and Terrell are said to have the full confidence of President Biden.

I assume Young does also.

I, oddly enough, sat next to, was it a dinner where I sat next to Steve Richetti, and he's the most avuncular, sort of Midwestern-y, friendly guy I've met in Washington to date.

He was such a lovely fella.

So I suspect

he was being that way.

He's like that all the time.

So I had a little more confidence when I heard his name.

But I think he seems to cross aisles quite a bit and is very well liked by the Republicans.

I can't imagine he wouldn't be.

In any case, will we get a deal before default day of June 1st, according to Jenny Ellen?

I think so.

I think this is a loser.

This is mutually assured destruction for both parties.

Biden would look terrible.

It'd be terrible for the country.

The Republicans would come out of this.

The incentives are aligned here to figure this shit out, and that's what they're going to do.

Yeah, I mean, there's some worry on the left that they're going to do these work requirements, but Biden said it's no big deal around payments.

So there's that.

And there's certainly worry that McCarthy will get more than he deserves for throwing a tantrum.

Nobody loves giving into a tantrum, obviously.

Yeah, what I've seen is,

I mean, I'm curious to get your thoughts here, but what I've seen is basically

Speaker McCarthy has said, Wink, Wink, just give me something symbolic that has no meaning that I can throw at the crazies and say we got something.

Yeah.

Because I wonder if they say that when the door closes, like, oh, good fucking heavens.

Like, anyway, sorry.

Well, you know what?

I forget who it was.

I don't know if it was Senator Bennett said something I thought that was really insightful and it made sense.

And that is, once the cameras go off, these people are surprisingly reasonable.

And that is, we live in a society where the algorithms reward craziness, and that raises donor money from the crazies.

And so people want to, once the cameras are on, they make these very bold, principled, angry statements.

And then they go behind closed doors and they're more reasonable.

And what Senator Warner also said,

which I thought was interesting, is that if you look at the last couple of years, it's actually been a fairly productive Congress.

That is true.

Especially the Senate.

Especially the Senate.

Yeah.

Yeah, that's true.

I think the fact that they're doing it in front of the camera is like, does everything have to be this performative bullshit?

Like, they're obviously going to get to an agreement.

Said two people with three podcasts.

Yeah, but we're paid to be performative bullshit.

Let me just say.

These people, no, they're not.

They're paid to like do the budget.

No, they're paid to do the fucking budget.

Like, and it drives me crazy.

Anyway, I likely they will get to that.

Wall Street will be happy, stocks will go up, et cetera.

Another story, interesting, since I know you know this guy pretty well.

I don't know, I know him just vaguely.

WeWork CEO Sandeep Mantrani will step down.

He became CEO in 2020, led the company to going public in 2021.

WeWork has since struggled to turn a profit and earlier this year struck deals to cut debt by $1.5 billion.

Current WeWork board member member David Tolley will take his place as interim CEO.

Shares of the company have tumbled at the news, leaving them down 96% for the year.

Obviously, they're suffering from nobody's going to work or, you know, they aren't necessarily the startups aren't starting up as much, et cetera, et cetera.

So what do you think?

You were sort of positive on this guy.

I know

you sort of smacked at WeWork for years, but you had good thoughts about him.

Sandeep is one of those sort of elder statesmen of the real estate business.

He ran his general growth properties, very, very very well-liked.

I wouldn't call his friends, but I've done some work with him.

Very smart, very well-respected.

My guess is he got an enormous pay package to come try and be a shepherd or a steward of WeWork.

I would say that this is probably the beginning of the end of this chapter of WeWork.

It strikes me as a similar situation.

I haven't spoken to him or anyone else at WeWork, but it strikes me as being similar to when that very well-respected CEO of Vice left.

This means the company is likely going to file chapter.

It It just doesn't.

I read the numbers.

It did $800 million in revenue and it lost $300 million.

And this isn't a growth company with IP that can justify those types of losses.

It means that the business just doesn't work.

Yeah, it never did, did it?

They spent too much money.

They entered into a series of long-term leases that basically made it impossible for them to ever make money.

No one's willing to look at this thing.

The markets aren't willing to look at this thing as a growth company.

And so effectively what you have is a company that is probably going to go BK.

It'll be interesting to see if whoever the creditors are that take control of the company can go through and cherry-pick the WeWorks that are making money.

But this is, I don't know, enough already.

Put this thing out of its misery.

Trevor Burrus, Jr.: Yeah.

Is there room for this kind of thing, office, like quick office rental space?

Because the whole commercial office business has got to be, you got to be crying almost every day.

Well,

that's the most interesting thing about this.

And that is people will spend some time talking about WeWork and reminiscing, but they're exhausted by it.

And the reality is it's gotten about 10 times more media than the significance of the company.

What they'll talk about, though, is what it says about the larger commercial real estate decline coming.

And this is the next, you know, Greece sovereign debt or the recession.

The thing we're going to start wringing our hands over is the structural decline and the pain that's about to be felt in commercial real estate.

And like everything else, it's nuanced.

There are some buildings in Manhattan that are doing really well.

And then there's other buildings in San Francisco that just got sold for 20 or 30% of their value just a few years ago.

So, but there is going to be a lot of pain.

The enduring structural change out of COVID, if you look at e-commerce, even if you look at teen depression, everything is where it would have been had that maintained its growth rates before

COVID.

In other words, the biggest things, retail, e-commerce, they look, if you didn't know COVID had happened and you just looked at where they are, you wouldn't know that COVID happened.

The structural change or the enduring structural change appears to be remote work.

Yeah.

Yeah, it's true.

But, you know, it's morally wrong not to go back to work.

I don't know if you know that.

Elon Musk said that in a, in a, the guy who makes cars so we can commute says it's morally wrong not to go back to work.

It's morally wrong.

In that interview on CNPC, did you know that?

You were committing a moral

offense to Elon.

People should get off the goddamn moral high horse with the work-from-home bullshit.

Because they're asking everyone else to not work from home while they do.

I always feel obligated to say that young people should get into the office.

It's a feature, not a bug for young people.

It is.

It's just going to be a different kind of office.

And I wonder if it's going to be more, you wonder if something like WeWork would do better if you create, you know, the one thing that the enduring attraction of WeWork was that they were kind of cool spaces to work in, right?

And most offices are really

deadly.

Flexibility.

And that was, that was to me the most it wasn't the beer or the kombucha on tap or whatever.

I felt it was like it was a nice place to go.

You felt okay going to an office.

And that's, I think offices have to rethink that if they want to bring more people.

And through most of the country, people are going back to the office through much of the country, but not in these big cities where people just can have choices and have still have more power.

But we'll see.

And also,

just to pause on WeWork, the real innovation around WeWork.

So first off, it's not innovative to give someone $100 worth of office space and charge them $70.

And that's what WeWork essentially has done.

They've given you, it's like those mattress companies that were sending you $800 worth of mattress for $600.

They just, it's a great deal for the tenant.

The real innovation around WeWork is that if you're an entrepreneur and I've experienced this, the real estate industry would make you sign five-year leases and one-year deposits.

It was just incredibly onerous and inflexible to get into this, to get into this key component of

organizational value.

And that was an office.

And they came in and said, just show up and then you can kind of leave when you want.

But enough already.

Take this thing out back and put a bullet in its head.

All right, then.

The EU's competition commission says it's game on for Microsoft's acquisition of Activision Blizzard.

The approval is conditional.

For one thing, the companies have to honor multiple 10-year deals, making Call of Duty available on all gaming platforms.

They were going to do this anyway.

Why wouldn't they?

But the deal still faces hurdles.

Last month, regulators in the UK said they planned to block it, and the

FTC here in this country sued to do the same.

The bid expires in July, but could be extended.

What do you think?

I mean, the European Commission holds a lot of weight here moving it forward if they get these conditions.

I think it means the deal goes through.

We thought it might happen, but yeah.

The UK blocking it.

The EU is the bigger, the bigger.

I also wonder if it's political at all.

I wonder if the EU is kind of fed up with that little Brexit bitch called the UK

and has said, all right, you know,

you can scream and get angry and throw throw your toys on the ground, but Europe is the second largest economy in the world.

There's just no getting around this.

This is a huge win for Microsoft and probably creates momentum that they'll get this.

FTC is the one.

If FTC settles with them and gets conditions, which they'll get, they'll sort of probably get similar conditions.

It'll go through.

And no one cares about the UK.

Was it Brexit pitch?

That's a really lovely term that you just made it.

I just made that.

It's almost as good as the German Shepherd showing up in the Subaru.

I'm more proud of that.

I don't feel that was good.

Anyway, yes, we both think this is probably going to go through.

I think, you know, they would like to get it.

If they don't, someone else will buy this company.

And

it looks like the game's in

Lena Kahn's corner right now to figure out what kind of conditions she can make it look good that she got some stuff out of them.

You interviewed her.

And then not have to go through this.

I just want everyone to know when Kara's interviewing someone important, who does she call and ask for questions?

Who does she call and say, give me a couple questions?

By the way, a bunch of people.

Amanda Cass.

Okay.

Who did she call second?

You.

I call.

That's right.

That's right.

I did.

I did.

Yes, I did.

Last this week.

It's up.

It's up.

Thanks for listening.

Yes, it's a really good interview with her.

And actually, she has a much more

less fire.

Yes, we should.

Less fiery tone.

She's learned how to deal in Washington.

She seemed very reasonable at the same time firm.

It was a very, she's, she's really, she's coming up to speed rather quickly

and still very firm on issues.

She sort of whacked at Facebook quite a bit.

She called them recidivists, which made me laugh several times.

It didn't make Facebook laugh, but I like the word recidivist.

She's like, oh, did I say that word?

How did I come up with it?

She's so smart.

It's crazy.

But yes, she's probably going to do a deal with them.

She'll do a deal with them.

All right, let's get to our first big story.

The nation's leading AI entrepreneur wants Congress to regulate artificial intelligence.

Maybe.

Sam Altman, the CEO of OpenAI, went before a Senate subcommittee on Tuesday to answer questions about generative AI.

He was joined by an executive from IBM, but unlike other tech hearings, senators were light with their criticism.

They're even kind.

They asked Altman about potential rules for AI tools.

Here's one exchange between Altman and Senator Blumenthal, who's usually beside himself of Connecticut.

Should we consider independent testing labs to provide scorecards and nutrition labels or the equivalent of nutrition labels.

Yeah, I think that's a great idea.

I think that companies should put their own sort of, you know, here are the results of our test of our model before we release it.

Here's where it has weaknesses, here's where it has strengths.

But also, independent audits for that are very important.

And

I'm excited for a world where companies publish with the models information about how they behave, where the inaccuracies are, and independent agencies or companies provide that as well.

I think it's a great idea.

It was a love fest.

That clip had been edited a little for clarity, but it was very much a love fest.

It was a very information gathering feeling.

They didn't attack him

the way they did Zuckerberg, for example.

You have tweeted, does he actually want regulation?

As you pointed out, Zuckerberg had said regulate us while lobbying against regulation.

There's no evidence that Altman has has lobbied against regulation.

He gave $250,000 to the Democratic Super PAC in 2020.

He's also donated to California Democrats.

He called for three things, a new regulatory agency, a set of safety standards for AI, and independent audits of AI models.

He didn't call for transparency requirements around what data was used for training, and he didn't call for prohibitions on using copyrighted works, although that's going to be a mess of trouble for a lot of companies.

What do you think?

Well, I thought at some point he was also going to call for the important conversation around gender balance or write a book on personal loss.

I mean, I just

we've been to this movie before, and

we live in a country where to be

one of the wealthiest people, to be a billionaire means to have people admire you, want your opinion on stuff, to laugh at your jokes.

To be a billionaire in the U.S.

is to be loved, and people want to.

I don't think he's a billionaire, just so you know.

Okay, yet.

Well, he doesn't actually have a stake in this.

Okay.

All right.

Well, let's play a game.

Who said this?

We need a more active role for governments and regulation.

October of 20.

Mark Zuckerberg or Cheryl Sandberg.

Okay.

No, she said Samberg calls for government regulation.

That was June of 19.

Google CEO Sunder Pachai.

Companies such as ours cannot just build promising new technology and let market forces decide how it will be used.

That was June of 20.

Twitter CEO Dorsey.

Generally, I think regulation is a good thing.

April of 19.

Well, CEO Nick Clegg, much has been said about Facebook recently, but there's one thing we agree on.

Congress should pass new internet regulations.

That's October of 20.

Snap Spiegel, our guy.

We definitely support thoughtful regulation.

That was in May of 2022.

Look, I

that is up to Congress not to pass it.

I don't know.

In this case, I think they are actually trying to be thoughtful and going around early to do these things.

Now, whether Congress does anything is another story.

Let me say, speaking of people I interviewed, Altman said a lot of what he told me in March when I spoke to him on my other podcast, which will not be named.

Except here he went a bit further.

Let's listen to that.

Congressman Ted Liu said there needs to be an agency dedicated specifically to regulating AI.

Is that a good idea?

I think people like us that are creating these very powerful systems that could become something properly called AGI at some point, those efforts probably do need a a new regulatory effort.

And I think it needs to be global body,

new regulatory body, and then having existing industry regulators still do their regulation.

Who should head that agency in the U.S.?

I don't know.

Anyway, he had said this very clearly and has been talking about a global body.

Same thing Lena Khan talked about.

She thought she had enough rules in place that she could do the regulation.

And so

this is way further along than previous efforts, I would say.

I would have to push back on you on that.

But go ahead.

I hope you're right.

I hope that Sam is true to his word and he seems like a lovely young man.

You like him.

Everyone I know thinks a lot of him.

And every piece of data says that he is full of shit and that he uses two weapons of mass distraction that have been used on us before.

One, pretending to want to be regulated.

And the new weapon of mass distraction is to refer to this company as the governing body, as a nonprofit.

I think 100 times the original investment goes back to the investors and management before it turns the money goes back to a nonprofit.

So they just shouldn't use the term nonprofit when they're talking about this company.

Yeah, that is true.

To create some sort of distraction that somehow they're more noble and not as profit-motivated as everybody else.

So I agree.

This was a love fest.

We have the Restrict Act.

We have antitrust and Amy Klobuchar.

And there's always a lot of head-nodding.

We always think we're going to get something done.

So you're right.

Let's move to the part where we actually create that regulatory body.

I think the first regulatory body should probably be, or hopefully we can walk and shoot on at the same time.

I like to be a division of NATO.

I think we need cross-border multilateral agency looking at this from a defense standpoint.

I do think this is a defense issue, but enough already.

Appoint somebody, get the commission going, have it be ground up, start with people who have technology backgrounds.

But I just feel, I'm sorry, we've been here before and we always get our hearts broken.

Well, let's talk about, I would agree.

I would agree.

But I think one, this particular technology is not protected the way the other one is.

So they knew there was nothing they could do.

And so there is liability.

So

they're going to tread much more lightly.

There's all kinds of significant copyright problems.

There's going to be another hearing on that coming up.

I do think Congress is doing the right thing doing these meetings.

This was a little bit of a low fest, I would agree.

I don't necessarily think they have to smack them, but it was, it was more of a fact-finding mission.

And I don't mind them doing that for a short amount of time.

You know, but let's talk about specific things.

We got a listener question via email.

Let's read it out.

Dear Mr.

and Mrs.

Swisher.

That's funny.

Do you think audio and visual media should have information about how much of the content written or performed is generated by AI?

Do you think

there will be some kind of labeling system like organic food that media will adopt so the customers at least have some idea of what they are consuming.

Thank you, Lars.

Well, Lars, I think that is a great idea.

And actually, so does Sam Altman.

It's not a bad idea.

Like, where's the provenance of things?

I think you're going to have to have some sense of where they collated all your information from so you can judge it.

I don't know, Scott, what do you think about that one?

I think it's a good idea, and it gets to one of the economic points.

And that is, if you're, I've been spending a lot of time in, or I was spending time in something called a writer's room.

And we've been talking a lot about the writer's strike.

And if you feed into an LLM every episode of Modern Family, such that you can help write the next great sitcom about an American family, those writers should be compensated.

There should be some sort of tool that not only indicates what percentage is AI generated, and quite frankly, I don't think the consumer is going to care as long as they feel like it's good information, or more importantly, it makes them feel good about themselves, whether it's misinformation or not.

But what you're going to need is you're going to need something similar to what the record industry has done a decent job of in the music industry.

And that is if you're KROQ 106.7, the greatest radio station in the history of mankind,

and you play a bunch of B52 songs, another amazing band, they at the end of the year send you a bill and say, okay, you've used this content to build your company.

There's going to need to be some sort of likely AI generative model that says, this is where you have fed the LLM.

This is the input to the LLM, and

we need to compensate them.

Yeah, and I think a lot of these companies have been, including ChatG OpenAI, about the details of the sources of data and all kinds of things.

They're trying to keep quiet about his training techniques, the amount of computing power.

And so they're a lot less open because there is more competition.

That's the thing.

But here's the thing.

If you're a nice white kid who's in technology, when you stand in front of Congress, the first three times they're really nice to you.

God, I just, I literally have PTSD from this bullshit.

Where there was Marissa Mayer standing in front of of Senator John Kerry saying about Google, well, it's, and he's saying the Seattle Post Intelligent just went out of business in about two years because their classified business gone.

And she was like, well, it's early, Senator.

I mean, I just, we've been here before.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Anyway,

I would agree.

So what would a regulatory agency look like?

And who should head it besides me?

I would say the following.

The most important thing is to get a regulatory body going.

The second most important thing is to ensure that when someone takes an Uber Kalinik-like approach with their generative AI and starts doing mendacious shit because they're like move fast and break things, that they get hit really hard, really early.

I think the algebra of deterrence needs to be set here that, okay, we're going to err on the side of prosecuting people that start generating misinformation around certain categories, regardless of whether or not you think you're an innovator, regardless if a name brand VC has given you money.

That shit's not going to hunt here.

I think early and often.

Yeah, well, it might not have the same First Amendment issues.

It's stymy social media regulation.

And as I said, it may not be protected by Section 230.

There is a lot more.

You know, they can't just bring in false First Amendment free speech arguments that they often tend to make that sometimes are applicable and most times are not.

So that's that.

It's, you know, they have liability just the way the New York Times does or anybody else.

That's right.

But the hard part is, how do you reverse engineer it to if somebody creates, says, give me 10 or 100 or a million tweets that are automatically uploaded or content uploaded LinkedIn in the voice of a regulatory body or a legitimate medical journal that vaccines alter your DNA,

it may be really difficult to reverse engineer it to the source.

But let me, I want to circle back.

I don't want to be a total Debbie Downer on this.

The most positive thing about, in my view, all of this is that this is likely, I believe this is the most enduring technology since probably mobile.

People say since web, I would say since mobile.

This is really exciting.

And the really wonderful thing is it's American.

The best companies in the world doing this are in America.

And that gives us an edge on our adversaries.

That gives us, that's going to spawn incredible economic growth.

I think this is going to result in job creation, not job destruction.

The most innovative product of the last 50 years has been the vaccines.

And this is a close, probably number three behind either the web or mobile.

And it's American.

So that's very.

It's American.

That said, when I interviewed him, and he also said it in Congress yesterday, he called for an international body,

which I tend to agree.

He compared it to the International Atomic Energy Agency.

That said, nuclear arms and power have always been products of the government, not individuals, and individual companies.

And so that's a little different here.

So, how do you regulate private companies?

You could sort of link it, I think, more to like CRISPR and cloning and things like that than you necessarily would the government.

But it's certainly, it has to be, there has to be an international standards body of what you can't make, like killer robots, no,

yes on this, no on this.

And so there's sort of rules of the road from the get-go.

And that's what's most important: who is going to, who is going to be the, it should be the U.S.

leading this effort to create this international body.

Probably should come out of the State Department, or I'm not sure where it should go.

I mean, it could come out of

the president.

It's got to come from the executive branch.

I was also at a dinner with Tony Blinken, and he was very interested in the State Department being part of it.

So

I don't know which one would push forward, the Commerce Department.

There's National Defense.

There's some sort of regulatory body to ensure that

it doesn't get out of control or we create this move even further into a post-true society.

But there's even three or four levels down beyond that.

The thing I am most worried about AI is that I see this terrible trend that stuck during COVID, and that is people, specifically young people,

are using some sort of digital form of a relationship where they think they have friends, but they're not experiencing friendship.

And rather than taking the risks of going out and making friends, meeting mentors, finding mates, they try and find some weak, low-risk

facsimile, whether it's Netflix or Tinder or porn, that decreases their motivation to socialize with other people.

And the result is a slow slip into depression.

And I wonder with open AI, or I worry about open AI, if we're going to be able to create everything from fake friends, fake girlfriends, and reasonably good sex bots, where we have an entire generation of young people that mistake friends and relationships for friendship and actual relationships

and become more and more sequestered from each other.

I mean, literally, the movie Her is playing out.

I guess.

I don't know.

I didn't like that movie.

Anyway, I'll have to go back and re-watch it.

I kind of, the director asked me what I thought, and I was like, eh, like at the time.

I don't know.

Just that's the first thing is a relationship.

That thing was ahead of its time.

It'll chill down just fine when you watch it.

All right.

I'll watch it now.

All right.

Okay.

Or go

probably a better film.

Was it Ex Makina, Machina?

Ex-Machina, ex-McKina.

Yeah, yeah, that one.

Yeah.

That one I thought was great.

I just, the fact is, the AI was part of it, and I think I could care less.

And that's, I could see a person falling in love with AI.

I can't see an AI falling in love with a person.

And one of the most rewarding things in life is to have real desire, real pining.

There's a reason that romantic comedies are two hours, not 10 minutes.

And we're creating a world with low-calorie, low-reward relationships where there's no obstacles or no disappointment.

And

it leads to a lack of life.

It leads to a lack of victory.

You know, it's really exciting,

speaking for a friend, to get asked to

prom at a different school when four girls at your own high school say no to you.

Yeah, you said that says, I can say this firsthand.

It's really exciting when you ask four girls to your prom at university high school and they all say no,

and then someone asks you to your prom at a different school.

I asked four girls and they all said no.

Oh, wow.

But that's life.

That's the wonder and the victory of life.

And instead, we're like, I know I'll have a fake relationship on a digital platform that's enhanced by AI, and I'll never know real desire, and I'll never know real victory.

Interesting, Scott, stay away from the AI.

That's all I have to say.

I'm not going to tell you that I went to all four proms.

That is unfair.

I went to fairness.

That is unfair.

Anyway,

Scott, I had lots of boyfriends, and I'm a lesbian, so think about it that way.

All right, Scott, let's go on a quick break.

When we come back, we'll talk about the new TikTok ban at West and take a listener question about the future of writing.

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Scott, we're back on our second big story.

Bad news for fans of air fryers and crocodile videos in Montana.

On Wednesday, the state became the first in the union to ban TikTok.

Governor Greg Gianforte signed the ban.

It's a law.

It imposes a fine on app stores that let users download the TikTok app.

It also fines TikTok itself.

If it operates in the state, there are no fines for TikTok users.

This ban is set to take effect on January 1st of next year.

Of course, it'll be overturned.

Both TikTok and the ACLU issued harsh statements accusing the bill of violating the First Amendment.

It completely does.

This is such endless fucking virtual signaling by these dumb, body-slamming governor of

Montana.

The state should should have no business here except for maybe banning TikTok and government things.

It's just the they really need to stop.

This is such

they were busy.

They finished doing their anti-trans stuff, anti-trans performer bills, and then moved on to this one.

They really should focus on roads and other issues in Montana, but they didn't.

What do you think?

I'm not sure.

I see the two as being equivalent.

I don't.

It's a waste of time.

It's a waste of time.

I love the great state of Montana.

I think it's incredibly beautiful.

I don't like TikTok.

I'd like it to be banned.

But you're right.

In terms of

it probably doesn't make sense for states to start banning media.

No, it's ridiculous.

There is a real danger from China, but our governor from Montana is not going to help anything.

And he's going to ruin it, too, at the same time, because he's shredding the Constitution.

You're right.

It's just, it'll be torched by the courts.

There's lots of ways to do it.

And instead, this guy just wants to jump out in front of, I don't know, Christy Noam or whoever the fuck is going to do it somewhere else it's literally the reason i'm comparing it to the trans thing is they all just got on the thing when they should be doing stuff for the people in the state of montana it's not going to work it's endless bullshit and this guy

has no business being in just get off get on the porch young young man well it could be it's not like it's not like he's a governor telling principals what pronouns they can use in schools.

Oh, wait, that's Florida.

Yeah, I'm sure he does have a bill like that.

Oh, come on.

They have whatever.

All these states are doing these meaningless.

The next one will be that lady in our city.

They don't want to be president, and they don't think they can be.

They can't inflame the crazies in every other state by just like making sure the fire department and the police department are working effectively.

I can't stand it when governors run for Senate and vice versa.

They are totally different jobs.

One's lawmaking and legislative.

One is an operational job.

One is you're supposed to make sure the roads work, that when it rains, the sewers are actually working.

Water.

Deal with water issues, governor i mean come on this is bullshit this is and by the way it also gets in the way of actual things our government needs to do around this particular company and i'm with you on this car swisher i'm with you i'm just pissed at this guy we stand together i i will go out on a limb here and i'll say he's being even if he's being truthful he's not being neutral he's not being truthful oh stop it you stop that listen don't insult her because i will come to florida i will fly to miami and slap you i will

you know uh look, this also gives TikTok a lot of high ground that it probably deserves in this moment, but it doesn't allow you to really look at this correctly.

And of course, they've been deploying ads.

You know, the senator said that

everyone's a TikTok lobbyist.

This is overreach on every single thing.

Speaking of right-wingers and social media, Elon Musk tweeted an attack on George Soros this week, likened the billionaire to X-Men Villain Magneto, and said he wants to erode the fabric of civilization.

Actually, Elon is eroding the fabric of civilization.

One thing he didn't mention is Soros sold over 100,000 shares of Tesla stock in the first quarter.

He said, of course, asked about his tweets and the conspiracy theories could alienate customers and hurt his business.

He paused for quite a while because that's what he does.

It's a part of his little stunt.

And I'm a genius and I must think for a minute thing.

And let's listen to what he said.

I'll say what I want to say.

And if

the consequence of that is losing money, so be it.

Said every three-year-old toddler wanting to keep his truck everywhere in the world.

Anyway, he certainly went on to say what he wanted.

Here is later in the interview arguing that the man who killed eight people in Texas earlier this month was not a white supremacist, even though everyone else does, including the state of Texas.

Go ahead.

Ascribing it to white supremacy was bullshit.

Okay.

And there's no proof, by the way, that he was not.

There's no proof.

I would say that there's no proof that he is.

And that's a debate you want to get into on Twitter.

Yes.

Because we should not be ascribing things to white supremacy

if it's false.

Yes, you shall not besmirch the good name of white supremacy.

Didn't he have a swastika to say that?

Yes, yes, yes, yes.

And the state of Texas.

That's kind of a tell, isn't it?

He had hundreds of posts online that including neo-Nazi material and white supremacy.

I honestly,

you know.

You don't want to say bad things to someone from South Africa, but boy, is it bleeding through that terrible history?

I don't know if that's the thing.

One of the many things that bothered me about, I have never understood the conspiracy theory and the hate that George Soros evokes.

And for Elon Musk to say about anybody that they hate humanity, that's what he said about George Soros.

George Soros hates humanity.

George Soros is a Holocaust survivor.

George Soros spends a dramatic amount of his wealth trying to promote democracy and freedom around the world.

And I'm sorry, he hates humanity.

So I don't, that is a really, that is a very aggressive thing to say about somebody.

You know, I don't like, I mean, I don't like Elon Musk.

I would never say that about him.

And I, but again, he's like trying to go red pill.

I think he's angry that he sold his stock.

But

I've never understood,

and Bill Gates gets some of that too.

I'm like, thank God that we have these people who make so much goddamn money and then turn around and think, okay, you know, Bill Gates says, I'm going to try and cure infectious diseases.

And George Soros says, I'm going to try and protect democracies all around the world.

I'm like, well, okay, billionaires could do a lot worse.

I've never understood this

red pill hate for George Soros.

I just don't get it.

This whole thing.

Now, besides the George Soros, this pretending this guy isn't exactly what he is.

I feel like like if you have Nazi tattoos and several, you might be a Nazi.

That's just me.

Or you might like them.

You might enjoy them.

You might enjoy their repertoire.

And I don't even know why he's picking this fight.

And can you imagine Linda Yaccarino going, oh, wait, this is all she's going to do?

He's going to say, and he doesn't care about money.

Like, he's a shareholders would like to have a word.

So do advertisers.

Yeah.

But, well, there's no shareholders of Twitter, but any except his friends who just are like, oh, Elon.

By the way, way, Tesla said it was going to advertise for the first time on in that.

That's what he said.

That was a big takeaway from that.

They said they need advertising.

That's a problem.

It usually just marketed on

his fame.

You know, they used that for years and years.

At one point,

in one of their filings, they said, historically, we've been able to generate significant media coverage of our company and our vehicles and believe we will continue to do so.

It was alluding to Musk.

To date, the vehicle sales, media coverage, and word of mouth have been primary drivers of our sales leads and have helped achieve sales without advertising, traditional advertising, and relatively low marketing costs.

Now they might advertise.

Thoughts?

So, and I will bring this back to the story, but two nights ago, when was it?

I got a call from Stephanie Rill saying, come on the 11th hour with Kara.

It'll be great.

With Kara.

And I'm like, what are we talking about?

And he said, well, we're going to talk about Elon Musk.

I'm like, I'm out.

I'm going to go drink.

I'm done talking about this guy.

He lives rent-free too much in my head.

And I wouldn't know about advertisement.

Yeah, but I've got a bunch of calls from media outlets saying we comment on Elon and advertising.

And I looked at what he said.

I think it's just one of his things where he just said it off the top of his head.

I don't think it means anything.

I don't,

one of the, in my opinion, one of the really most innovative things about Tesla is that,

is that Elon Musk has massively leveraged Twitter and new mediums to get the equivalent of billions of dollars in free advertising.

And one of the reasons that Tesla has much greater margins than the other automobile companies is they spend almost nothing on advertising.

It was like Leia Coca, right?

And as a professor of brand strategy who made his living preaching about the power of intangible assets resulting in a rational margin and advertising, the reality is advertising, to a certain extent, kind of outside who is not getting it.

And if you think about the best products in the world and the best companies in the world, show me a company that's aggregated or acquired or accreted more than $100 billion in market cap within, say, 36 months.

And I'll show you a company that doesn't really advertise like a traditional company

in its sector.

So this was another head fake to get a headline.

I don't know.

I doubt they're even going to do it.

They don't think they're going to do it.

I think they're going to need to.

I don't think people are as hot on Tesla.

They ought to find a way to sell them.

Yeah.

I think they're going to need to.

They're going to need to be like doing their advertising.

I don't think they can avoid it with the competition.

There's too much.

Yeah.

he gets

so much.

He can, I mean, keep in mind, he doesn't have to do that.

Negative now.

Negative attention now.

Before it was largely positive.

You know, and the same thing with on Twitter, he's got at some point, he's got to get advertisers to want to advertise there, right?

Maybe Tesla can advertise on Twitter.

That's that's

a key point because this is what this is the trick that Google and Meta used to do.

First, they throw parties and they call these advertisers and people their partners as they basically basically put a gun to their head and execute them.

But they used to advertise a little bit, right?

To maintain good relationships with their quote-unquote partners.

Can you help us?

We're going to spend a little money, throw them a bone.

Here's kind of your last meal.

And we want to have Amazon would advertise a little around the holidays.

And I don't know if they were testing it, if they were sincere about it, or they just wanted to maintain.

you know, throw a few bones at the people that they were putting out of business.

Except he needs advertising compared to them.

They They didn't need it.

I think they do.

I think Tesla needs it now.

I think they do.

Look, the margins were down.

The numbers were down.

It's only, these aren't going up.

These are not going up because of him anymore.

They're not going to be up.

That's a function of competition.

The question is, the question is.

No, it's also him.

It's like he's rejected.

I literally have, and I'm not just talking to like a lot of people are like, oh, I'm looking at the, I have gotten so many emails and calls from people.

Not, they don't say they're woke people because they're not.

They're like, what else is out there?

Like, that's the nature of people, right?

They want something fresh.

So I don't know.

I think he needs to advertise.

And I think it's a very yeah, but you're what you're saying, though, is that advertising offers an ROI.

How is he going to get people to buy the cars if other cars are just as good and prettier?

Honestly, they're all prettier than the Tesla now.

They're

well, I mean, that's a different issue.

That's a product problem.

But

what you have is the companies that have added a lot of value.

It used to be, I mean, if I'm thinking about watching the entire, I love watching an entire series with my kid.

And my 15-year-old nine just ripped through Game of Thrones, which is probably inappropriate, but it's bonding.

And I'm thinking about when he turns 16, I would like to watch the entire Mad Men series again.

I just thought it was amazing and so interesting.

And it's such a lesson on kind of the diamond.

It's such a great period piece.

And it's also a really interesting insight into work and advertising.

And when I came a professional age, a good ad campaign could literally change the trajectory of a company.

They could.

Kia or Hyundai, I forget who it was, had this amazing ad campaign and it literally increased their market share three points, which is enormous in the world of automobiles.

That doesn't happen anymore because people aren't glued to their TVs.

People with any money aren't watching ad-supported media.

People, you know,

product innovation went through this massive golden age unlocked with digital innovation.

And all of a sudden, product and innovation and supply chain innovation became the way you built your brand, not advertising.

So I'm not even sure a limited amount, sure, but I don't know.

The golden age of Don Don Draper has been drawn.

Well, I don't know how they're going to sell cars then because someone's got this.

This guy is getting negative attention and he doesn't care if it has consequences.

But advertising isn't going to save him from himself.

Yep.

He needs to butt the fuck out of this stuff and just work on the products.

That's all he needs to do.

But he's not going to do it.

Okay, Scott, let's pivot to a listener question.

You've got, you've got.

I can't believe I'm going to be a mailman.

You've got mail.

This question comes from two.

Hi, Kara and Scott, not Mr.

and Mrs.

Swisher.

As an independent author, I've been watching the rise of narrative AI with interest.

Right now, their prose is fever dreams, but it's going to improve.

Do you see a future for human authors?

And if AI-written books flood the market, what can human creatives do to stand out?

Thank you.

Two Verd.

I don't know, Scott.

What do you think?

Do you like the idea of being married to me, be honest?

I don't.

I'm thinking of seeking a divorce.

Yeah, I'm going to hire a very high-priced divorce attorney.

I've already talked to every divorce lawyer in town to contaminate them.

Thanks, Tom.

I had the best divorce in the world.

It was called My Divorce, Tragically Amicable.

We're still friends.

Mine was

actually made it more sad.

I'm like, wait, why are we getting divorced again?

Mine was amicable, too.

Ours is going to be ugly, though.

Ugly.

AI written books flood the market.

Can human creatives do to stand out?

Can you stay on top?

Are you planning to divorce me?

I am since the beginning.

I just want you for your money and your apartments.

I want the apartment in the settlement.

I said, every woman in my life, quite frankly.

Yeah, exactly.

I think I deserve it, honestly.

Yeah.

I really, in a weird way, I really do put out for you.

Anyway,

human creatives.

What can they do to stand out?

Answer to this question.

That was good.

I know.

I'm getting better at these sexualities.

This is every technology has a similar effect, and that is it consolidates the market.

And it, it basically,

if you're a middling lawyer drafting leases, vanilla leases, you're in a lot of trouble.

If you're a writer who just does okay work, but not great work,

watch out.

Here it comes.

But if you're a thoughtful person that's creative and knows how to, AI is not going to take your job.

Someone who understands AI is going to take your job.

And

this is, I'm already using Notion AI, one of our advertisers.

And I will take, so for example, I will take,

we're talking about, and this is going to be scary, about starting something called, you know, the original AI ProfG

and feed in my book, my most recent book on,

I wrote something called The Algebra of Wealth, feed in every transcript from every ProfG podcast and create a generative AI that could potentially answer questions.

But the thing is, the thing you feed into it is

what makes it original or different.

And so if you're someone who can produce produce really great original work, your compensation is going to go up.

If you're someone that needs to constantly rely on generative AI for other stuff,

you're probably in trouble.

But if you're doing original work and using

generative AI to help you, to inspire you, to fill in gaps, to make stuff better, you're going to become a warrior.

So this is...

This doesn't make you obsolete.

It makes mediocre people obsolete.

And what will happen is there'll be unbelievable new businesses and there'll be new adjuncts and new services and new jobs created by these little companies and they'll become medium and big sized companies that do really cool things with generative AI.

There is an interesting thing.

This guy named Jake Ward on Twitter put, we took a website from zero to 750K a month SEO traffic using 100% AI generated content.

7K total pages generated hit 300K a month after six months, 750 after 12, 4K plus keywords in positions one and three, 13K plus keywords and positions four through 10.

He did this whole breakdown.

And to me, it's Demand Media AI edition is what it's doing for that market, right?

If you remember Demand Media, who kind of was a content farm.

And this is a version of a content farm.

And he's right, mediocre, you're fucked.

Any press releases,

earnings releases, things like that, anything that can be done in this way.

And then a human checks it, sure,

is gone.

And even and much stuff is, much marketing material is meaty, is just, it's easy to copy.

It's easy to do.

And so that's really, you have to be creative, really hyper-creative.

Look,

there's certain industries that are just going to, I've always thought that disruption is more a function of how ripe the industry is.

I don't think, I think everyone's talking about writers right now.

And I do have a prediction around the writer's strike.

We'll get to that.

I think the industry that's going to,

there's the mother of all chins right now is healthcare.

I would not want to be a pathologist, a virologist, or a radiologist right now because there's a lot of money.

Radiologists have already been under siege.

Yeah.

There's no reason why.

AI is really good at looking at patterns and then predicting, all right, if you give me a million data points, I'll give you with really great accuracy what the million and first data point will be.

And it strikes me that looking at stuff under a microscope and trying to understand what is the pathogen here, that AI is just going to do that better.

And we've been over,

I don't want to say we've been overpaying these people because the end practitioners haven't done as well but the insurance company the people have inserted themselves in the middle in the pharma companies you got to think that that's where ai is really gonna boom yeah it's gonna be a real but books too i'm sorry to tell you there's a lot of mediocre writing out there and this will be mediocre for you and mediocre but necessary the banal but needed like is you just have to have it around like here's your explanation for this and that and the other thing so there's you just you don't have the imagination big enough to figure out where this is going.

But we have to move on.

But go ahead, Leslie.

But the last point.

Like, I like Yval Noah, Hari, the guy who wrote Sapiens.

Yeah, Harari.

Him with Armed with AI.

His next book, I can't even imagine the kind of content he's going to be able to produce because the way his mind works, his ability to connect instinct with human behavior and what the future might look like, I just don't think any AI can come up with that.

But what he'll be able to do is say, all right,

give me a history of Homo sapiens, you know, in this,

you know, in this era and what happened.

And he will have just a level of

rigor and research.

He wasn't, he didn't have access to for.

If as long as it's from good sources, that's the thing.

So we'll have to see.

But you still require creativity and a certain flair.

Yval has a beautiful writing style, I think.

So that is, is you can start to mimic it, but it's still very hard to mimic certain people, like Scott Galloway, for example.

Good.

No generative AI comes up with a German Shepherd.

My ex-husband, Scott Galloway, my ex, my ex, my soon-to-be ex.

I'm taking the kids, I'll be at my sisters.

If you've got a question of your own and you'd like them answered, send it our way.

Go to nymag.com/slash pivot, submit a question for the show, or call 8-5551-Pivot.

All right, Scott, one more quick break.

We'll be back for predictions.

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Okay, Scott, let's hear a prediction.

So in the 80s in Britain, the coal miners, or I think it was the

coal mining prediction, but go ahead.

Go ahead.

I'm setting it up.

I don't want to be replaced by AI.

I'm trying to provide some creative context here.

All right.

So I think it was the National Minecrafters or Mineworkers Union took on Margaret Thatcher.

And basically, Thatcher said, this is my moment to show that I'm the Iron Lady.

We need to move to different types of energy.

and just said no over and over and basically broke the back of the coal miners union.

The same thing's about to happen here with the writers.

They have the same skill set or a similar skill set to authors, to journalists, and they make a lot more money.

In addition, this, I mean, this is a dream come true for the studios and enforced multilateral pause in spending as they recalibrate and have cloud cover to come back with fewer employees.

The union here, the writers' union has so badly miscalculated the power dynamic here.

And

the studios are going to slowly but surely, quietly, they are going to break their backs.

And this is going to end really poorly for the writers.

It's going to end, I can't,

it's almost, I wouldn't be surprised if we found out that the studio heads got together and said, piss off and upset the writers' union so they go on strike and force all of us to stop spending and producing content because every individual is like, I got eight shows I haven't gotten to yet that I'd like to, that I'd like to watch.

So, this is going to be reminiscent.

This is the information age coal miner strike in the UK.

It's going to end really poorly for the writers.

They are totally, and all this virtue signaling with stars that make 10 and 20 million dollars a year showing up and pretending that they stand with their brothers and sisters.

I just think it's hilarious.

You're going to see this union come back to the table, and the studios are going to just do what used to happen to me when i was trying to raise money through the 90s with vcs they're going to grin fuck them and say that's interesting writers are really important to us we should keep talking and they're going to do nothing and then when a bunch of the the writers that are going to be replaced by ai anyways start thinking i can't pay my rent and start putting pressure on the union to settle the union's going to end up with a worse deal than they had going into this thing.

So my prediction, the information age equivalent of the British coal miner strike is happening with the writer's strike, and it's going to end the same way.

Who's Margaret Thatcher?

So the studio heads are Margaret Thatcher.

You don't get my analogy?

I thought that was pretty good.

I do.

I get it.

I agree with you.

A bunch of writers and actors have written me, and I'm like, I think you're ⁇ I don't think you have leverage here.

I don't see the leverage.

Maybe I'm missing it.

Well, you know who the culprit is?

We're creative is not enough leverage.

And I applaud writers.

They're angry.

They're angry at the studio heads.

The real culprit is all the kids who work for me at ProfG.

They don't watch ad-supported TV.

They all watch TikTok.

850 million creators on TikTok.

Assume 1% of them are any good.

They have so misread the situation.

And if I were a studio head, I would be thinking, oh my God, thank God for this union.

They have given us a gift.

Yeah, I don't know how many.

Their signs are creative.

They're just the leverage.

I don't see it.

I don't see it.

I'm getting a lot of angry letters from writers, but I'm sorry to tell you.

I'm not sure what you should ask for.

And I agree.

But they're going to be smaller writers' rooms.

They just don't want to pay as much, and they're not going to have to

on some level.

And this is the danger here is creating a disgruntled group of creatives that work for you eventually, because you do need creativity to really do well.

But I have to say, the leverage is not there.

I think you're right.

Good prediction, Scott.

Good prediction.

Do you have anything, Carol?

No, I don't have a prediction.

I'm just right.

I just report and I'm correct.

This is the second week in a while.

I don't know what I'm going to do the third week in a row.

I'll think of something.

I got two in a row so far.

I've got to think about what I want to.

Unfortunately, I'm often right about Elon Musk stuff.

Unfortunately, I'm often right.

Yeah,

that's your biggest problem.

How right you are.

Here's one.

I had a whole show on it with Ryan Mack and Zoe Schiffer today about it.

But one thing that came out that Ryan just tweeted was about some guy suing them who was working on their operations team.

And they wanted to install shitty locks

in offices that would put people in danger and said, just do it because no one will catch us.

Like, this guy is alleging this.

I just,

every time I think I'm like disappointed, I'm like, you're kidding me.

Like, really?

Anyway, it's just, I don't have a prediction, except that I'm always surprised by how the depths of bad behavior.

Anyway, Scott, that's the show.

We'll be back on Tuesday with more pivot.

Can you read us out?

Today's show was produced by Lara Naiman, Evan Engel, and Taylor Griffin.

Ernie Endertot engineered this episode.

Thanks also to Drew Burrows and Mil Severio.

Make sure you're subscribed to the show wherever you listen to podcasts.

Thanks for listening to Pivot from New York Magazine and Vox Media.

We'll be back next week for another breakdown of all things tech and business.

Kara, my wife, have a great weekend.

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