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0:35

did you hear that Facebook pokes are back? Have you

0:37

heard this? I have, because Facebook

0:39

has mounted an aggressive marketing campaign that has

0:41

made me very suspicious as to whether this

0:44

is actually true. Yeah, Meta

0:46

claims that it made a design tweak at

0:48

the beginning of this year to make the

0:50

poke button, which had been previously pretty hard

0:52

to find, slightly more visible, and that as

0:54

a result, the number of pokes on Facebook

0:56

went up 13 times

0:58

after this design change. Yeah, and they

1:00

find that in cultures, you know, as

1:02

pokes go up, it's directly correlated with

1:05

a rise in childbirth. So, in nine

1:07

months from now, we're going to see a

1:09

whole new crop of poke babies. And now,

1:11

did you have any notable

1:13

poking experiences back in the day? That

1:16

I'm comfortable sharing on this podcast? Yeah,

1:19

keep it PG, please. Um, I

1:22

mean, no, I never had the sort of

1:24

meet cute, you know, where like a cute

1:26

guy poked me, and then we entered into

1:28

a whirlwind romance. Did you have an experience

1:30

like that? I didn't have a meet cute,

1:32

but I had like a kind of a

1:34

mildly traumatic experience involving Facebook pokes, which

1:36

is, so my freshman year of college,

1:38

we all got access to Facebook. And

1:42

my mom, who worked

1:44

at a college and also had

1:46

an EDU email address, also

1:49

got access to Facebook. And she was, this

1:51

was before adults and, you know, sort of

1:53

the rest of the world was given access

1:56

to. So she was like the only parent

1:58

that anyone of my friends knew. who was

2:00

on Facebook. She was the first mom on Facebook. She was

2:02

one of the first moms on Facebook. Very cool trendsetter. And

2:05

a bunch of kids in my dorm thought

2:07

that it would be hilarious to start a

2:09

Facebook group called I Poked Kevin Ruth's Mom.

2:12

And so, like dozens of

2:14

times a day, my

2:18

friends at college were poking my mom

2:20

and then posting about it on this

2:22

Facebook group and it became like a

2:24

minor campus phenomenon. And I eventually

2:27

had to beg my friend who started it to shut

2:29

it down. How'd your mom respond to this turn

2:31

of events? She was delighted and actually when she

2:33

came to visit for Parents Weekend, she already knew

2:35

all of my friends. These

2:38

guys have been poking me for months now. Yes,

2:41

humiliating. But, you know, glad other people

2:43

will be able to have that experience

2:45

now. Yes, me too. I'm

2:52

Kevin Ruth, a tech columnist at the New York Times.

2:54

I'm Casey Newton from Platformer. And this is hard for

2:56

a six week on the show. So part of the

2:58

Justice Lewis Apple will poke down the

3:01

lawsuit. Ben, social psychologist Jonathan

3:03

Hite joins to talk about how social media

3:05

re-learned all his brains and all

3:07

he can do about it. And finally,

3:09

run an IPO. I'm Kevin

3:11

from the United States of America. Casey,

3:19

big news this week. Tell

3:29

me about it. This is one of

3:31

those like stop the presses moments in

3:33

the world of tech. This is a

3:35

push alert situation. Yes, yeah. So on

3:37

Thursday this week, the U.S. Department of

3:39

Justice and 16 states filed a major

3:42

antitrust lawsuit against Apple, alleging

3:44

that the company violated antitrust laws by

3:46

creating an illegal monopoly with the iPhone.

3:48

The long arm of John Law caught

3:50

up with old Tim Cook, Kevin. Yes.

3:54

Okay, Casey, we're gonna break down this lawsuit

3:56

and talk about all of the DOJ's allegations.

3:58

But first, are you surprised by... this did

4:00

we know that this was coming we did in

4:02

fact it was just about a week ago that

4:04

Bloomberg reported that the Department of Justice had had

4:07

a final meeting with Apple giving Apple one last

4:09

chance to plead its case and the reporting at

4:11

the time suggested this is typically the last step

4:13

before a lawsuit is filed so yes we did

4:16

know this was coming but what I would say

4:18

is we didn't know what the contents of the

4:20

lawsuit would be we didn't know what the allegations

4:22

would be we didn't know what the supporting evidence

4:24

would be and now we have 88 pages of

4:27

that to wade through yes it's a big lawsuit

4:29

and we've been frantically reading through it trying

4:31

to figure out what exactly is being alleged here

4:34

and we should say like this is the

4:36

big one this is the biggest and most

4:38

ambitious case against Apple that has been filed

4:40

yet there's a case in

4:42

Europe that we've talked about a little

4:44

bit on this show that sort of

4:46

goes after Apple's App Store practices and

4:48

whether it has enforced illegal terms there

4:50

against developers but this takes on really

4:52

like the whole iPhone ecosystem is

4:55

part of the DOJ's case here and

4:57

if it succeeds this lawsuit could have

4:59

huge implications for Apple so let's get into

5:01

it the complaint is 88 pages long and

5:05

it starts with a quote from an

5:07

Apple executive who emailed Steve Jobs back

5:09

in 2010 sort of

5:11

an interesting what we might call in

5:13

the news business an anecdotal lead anecdotal

5:17

lead the DOJ says basically it

5:20

talks about this ad that Amazon

5:22

made for the Kindle e-reader app

5:25

which starts with a woman's or using an

5:27

iPhone to buy ebooks and read them and

5:29

then she switches to an Android and

5:32

continues to read on the same Kindle

5:34

app the horror I know and so

5:36

this executive unnamed in the complaint wrote

5:38

to Steve Jobs that a

5:40

message that can't be missed is that it is

5:43

easy to switch from iPhone to Android not fun

5:45

to watch and I

5:47

believe the executive then burst into tears yes

5:50

yes so this is basically the DOJ's

5:53

attempt to say that Apple has spent

5:55

you know more than a decade at

5:57

this point sort of locking people in

6:00

through various schemes to the iPhone

6:02

ecosystem in an attempt to stop

6:04

them from switching to Android devices

6:06

or other smartphones and that all

6:09

this is shady and Illegal

6:11

now, I think this will be a

6:13

good time to talk about market definition

6:15

Kevin Yes So typically when antitrust enforcers

6:18

allege that a company has broken the

6:20

law when it comes to antitrust They

6:22

will sort of define a market. Are

6:24

we talking about all smartphones? Are we

6:27

talking about some smartphones? So in this

6:29

case, how does the DOJ and these

6:31

states how do they define the market?

6:34

So they say that this case is

6:36

about what they call performance smartphones. I

6:38

like that. Yeah, like like performance ass

6:40

leisure Exactly and

6:42

they distinguish them from the low-end smartphones the sort

6:45

of you know They're the Android phones that you

6:47

might be able to pick up for 50 or

6:49

100 dollars They have a

6:51

bunch of different things that they say distinguish these

6:54

phones including better materials and

6:57

NFC chip inside to do payments But

6:59

they're saying that is the market and

7:01

they're saying Apple has about 70% of

7:04

it in the United States Why is

7:06

this important in an antitrust case market

7:08

definition is everything Apple is going to

7:10

do everything in its power to

7:12

say You know, we're not only competing

7:15

against low-end Android smartphones Kevin We're competing

7:17

against dishwashers and refrigerators, right? Like like

7:19

the real market here is electron the

7:21

real market is capitalism That's

7:27

what Apple is gonna say But I thought

7:29

it was really interesting reading through this complaint

7:31

that that the DOJ said no No, no,

7:33

there actually is a defined market for a

7:36

certain kind of consumer if you're gonna get

7:38

a performance smartphone You're either gonna get an

7:40

iPhone or one of maybe a very

7:42

small number of high-end Android phones But

7:44

in the United States Apple has that

7:46

market locked up, right? so they basically

7:49

break this down into five big categories

7:51

of Sort of activity that they believe

7:53

Apple has undertaken that are all sort

7:55

of in violation of federal antitrust law

7:57

So the first complaint that the DOJ

8:00

makes is about what it calls super apps.

8:02

Now these are these apps that we've seen

8:04

in Asia. They're very popular there. These

8:07

are apps that basically contain a

8:09

bunch of different apps within them. So you

8:11

can pay for stuff. You can order food.

8:13

You can buy stuff online.

8:15

You can do social media. You can

8:17

do texting. These sort of like WeChat

8:20

style super apps that the DOJ says

8:22

have not taken off in the United

8:24

States and in the West

8:26

more generally in part because Apple has

8:28

suppressed them. And I will say that

8:30

of everything that the DOJ chart this

8:32

was the one that I thought was

8:34

the weirdest because they're really or only

8:37

a handful of super apps around the world.

8:39

WeChat in China is by far the biggest

8:41

one. So why does the DOJ care? Well

8:43

one thing I would point to is Roblox.

8:46

Roblox is one of the weirdest companies in

8:48

the app store because they sell all of

8:50

these games that you can buy. But you're

8:52

not supposed to be able to run your

8:54

own app store within the app store. So

8:56

Roblox has to call every game in its

8:58

app store and experience. Right. So it sort

9:00

of has to contort itself around Apple's crazy

9:02

rules. And if you're wondering why is a

9:04

super apps thing in there. Well maybe if

9:06

the DOJ could get some relief here Roblox

9:08

could just call their games games. Right.

9:10

And the DOJ alleges that Apple has made it so that

9:12

for example if you do want to offer these experiences

9:15

within your app you basically have to treat

9:17

that as a new update of an app.

9:19

It has to go through review every time

9:21

you want to change something which in the

9:23

case of a game you know you might

9:25

be making multiple changes a day to a

9:27

popular game. And so the DOJ alleges that

9:30

Apple by suppressing these super apps by making

9:32

it hard to have kind of apps within

9:34

an app for iOS at least

9:37

that this is sort of illegal anti-competitive

9:39

behavior. The complaint hilariously you know

9:41

we love a an out of

9:43

context employee email in a lawsuit.

9:46

We love it. It is the best. So there

9:48

is a good one in this section. The complaint

9:51

talks about how an Apple manager said at some

9:53

point we don't know if this was an email

9:55

or a text or something else. He

9:58

says imagine buying an app. Expletive

10:00

Android I assume that's fucking in right imagine

10:02

buying a fucking Android for 25 bucks at

10:04

a garage sale And it works fine box

10:06

belt Bu X by the way And

10:10

now you have a solid cloud computing device

10:12

imagine how many cases like that there are

10:14

and then he presumably burst into tears So

10:18

so basically It's you know what this Apple

10:20

manager is saying is something that Apple's critics

10:22

have been also saying for many years that

10:24

if Apple did Allow these kind

10:26

of super apps that it would be much

10:29

easier to say buy a low-end Android

10:31

smartphone and do most or all of the same things

10:33

that you can do with your iPhone right out of

10:35

the box and that This would give people much

10:38

bigger incentives to save money by switching

10:40

from iPhones to much cheaper hardware Yeah,

10:42

so that's the super apps part of

10:44

the complaint the next one number two

10:46

is cloud streaming game This

10:49

is a kind of service that has

10:51

been available on some platforms for many

10:53

years basically instead of playing a video

10:55

game in which all of the sort

10:57

of computation and the Processing

10:59

is taking place on your device These

11:02

are services that will basically put that all in

11:04

the cloud so that you only have to have

11:06

a very low-end piece of hardware In order to

11:08

play a high-powered game Apple

11:10

for many years has denied access to

11:13

the App Store for cloud-based gaming services

11:15

It did start to change that earlier

11:17

this year Presumably because it knew that

11:20

this was part of the the antitrust

11:22

complaint But basically this is

11:24

one area where the DOJ says that Apple

11:26

has stifled competition Yeah I mean and they

11:28

have there have been cloud streaming games that

11:30

wanted to put their apps in the App Store

11:32

and Apple said No And so there just was

11:34

not a market for that and why did Apple

11:36

not want those games on its App Store? Was

11:38

it for privacy or security? No It was because

11:40

that way Apple couldn't take a cut of the

11:42

game revenue Right or it wouldn't be able to

11:44

take as much of a cut as it wanted

11:46

to so yeah This just seems plainly one also

11:48

because if you don't need the powerful Processing power

11:51

to play the game because it's all happening in

11:53

some data center somewhere on the cloud Then

11:55

maybe you don't need the latest iPhone. Yeah,

11:57

I call duty iPhone for another couple years

11:59

exactly So this is something that is at

12:02

one of the DOJ's complaints here. All

12:04

right. That's number two. Number

12:06

three, messaging apps. We've talked about this one on the

12:08

show before. The DOJ says

12:11

that Apple is deliberately making third

12:13

party messaging services worse on the

12:15

iPhone relative to its own messages

12:17

app. The DOJ writes, quote, Apple

12:19

is knowingly and deliberately degrading quality,

12:21

privacy and security for its users

12:23

and others who do not have

12:25

iPhones. Apple also harms

12:27

developers by artificially constraining the size

12:29

of their user base. And

12:32

the DOJ also singles out a

12:34

very funny quote from Tim Cook

12:36

that took place in an interview.

12:39

I think the code conference was at the code

12:41

conference or some other tech conference. It was at

12:43

the code conference where Tim Cook was basically asked

12:45

on stage like, you know, I can't I can't

12:47

send videos to my family members or to my

12:49

mom who who doesn't have an iPhone. It doesn't

12:51

work on the messaging app. And Tim Cook's response

12:53

was buy your mom an iPhone, which

12:56

the DOJ then used in this

12:58

complaint to basically say that Apple is effectively

13:00

shutting out other messaging

13:03

apps by making them worse than

13:05

the default message app. Also Kevin, in

13:07

2016, Apple senior vice president of worldwide

13:09

marketing said, quote, moving iMessage to Android

13:11

will hurt us more than help us.

13:13

So it's here on the record. We've

13:15

all known this for years. We've known

13:17

why Apple doesn't make iMessage available and

13:20

Android. But here it all is in

13:22

black and white in this lawsuit. It

13:24

is kind of amazing to see federal

13:26

antitrust regulators and just the highest law

13:28

enforcement agency in the nation deal

13:30

with the green bubble issue. Finally, the government

13:32

is doing something we care about. I mean,

13:35

what else do we want the government working

13:37

on? I don't know. If you're an

13:39

Android user and you send a text to an iPhone

13:41

user, the iPhone basically says to the iPhone user, hey,

13:43

it looks like a poor person's trying to text you.

13:45

Do you want to call the police? So

13:47

Apple really made its own bet here, Kevin.

13:51

Right. So we've talked about this too,

13:53

but Apple is sort of begrudgingly planning

13:55

to sort of update it

13:57

the way it handles text messages on the

13:59

iPhone. It does plan

14:02

to support something called RCS, which is sort

14:04

of a more kind of,

14:06

you know, friendlier to Android style

14:08

of messaging that it says will

14:10

come to the iPhone later this

14:12

year. But this is one

14:14

that annoys a lot of people, and I think it

14:16

is an underrated factor in why people do not switch

14:18

from iPhones to Android phones. And so

14:21

that is something that the DOJ and these states are

14:23

bringing up as well. Yes. Also

14:25

note that the SMS-based messaging that you get

14:27

if you're not using iMessage or

14:29

you're sending a message from an Android phone, it

14:31

is not as secure as these RCS messages. So

14:34

for all the talk that Apple loves to do

14:36

about protecting your privacy and security, this was a

14:38

clear case of something where Apple could have moved

14:40

to make phones more private and

14:42

more secure for their users, but they chose not to because

14:44

there was a business advantage for them in not doing it.

14:48

So that's number three. Number four in the

14:50

DOJ's complaint is this issue of smartwatches. And

14:52

I got to say, this surprised me a

14:54

little bit that the DOJ and the states

14:56

spent so much ink on

14:59

the issue of smartwatches and basically how

15:01

hard it is for companies that are not Apple

15:03

to make smartwatches that work well with iPhones. Where

15:05

did you make of this? I sort of agree.

15:07

You know, I wouldn't put this at the top

15:09

of my list of things that I care about.

15:12

But the DOJ hones in on the

15:14

fact that if you make a third-party

15:16

smartwatch, Apple makes it very hard, for

15:18

example, to send a reply from that

15:20

other smartwatch. And they identify all of

15:22

these ways in which it really just

15:24

is easier and better to use an

15:26

Apple watch and it is important to

15:28

the DOJ because it shows how Apple

15:31

has used its dominance in these

15:33

performance smartphones to extend

15:35

it into other categories like smartwatch. You

15:38

can imagine a world where Apple made

15:40

every API available to developers of their

15:42

smartwatches as it did for its own

15:44

smartwatches. Maybe we have more competition in

15:46

smartwatches. That's not happening. That's why the

15:48

DOJ cares. Right. And this is, I

15:50

would say, true for a lot of

15:52

Apple accessories. I mean, if you've ever

15:54

tried to use non-AirPod Bluetooth headphones with

15:56

an iPhone, it's not easy. I do this

15:58

every day because the the little the air

16:00

pods they don't stick in my ears Okay,

16:02

I don't know. I don't know what's going

16:05

on with my ears Kevin, but they're they're

16:07

too slick the little play It doesn't matter

16:09

what size I the AirPods Pro.

16:11

They're always falling out of my ear So I

16:13

use these Sony earbuds and it truly always feels

16:15

like a coin flip whether they are going to

16:17

connect to my phone I have to pray every

16:19

time I want to listen to a podcast. So

16:21

I am living through this every day Thank you

16:23

Department of Justice for taking an

16:25

interest Finally the

16:28

weirdly shaped ear caucus will

16:30

have its day in court

16:35

So this but they've spent more time talking

16:37

about this issue of smartwatches and basically the

16:39

same issue It is very easy to pair

16:41

an Apple watch with an iPhone They make

16:43

that super easy if you're a you know, but

16:45

if you're wearing a pixel watch or not, I

16:47

forbid some other watch It's

16:50

not gonna work nearly as well I did actually

16:52

didn't realize this but in the complaint it talks

16:54

about how if you are a You

16:56

know wearing an Apple watch and using an

16:58

iPhone and you turn off Bluetooth on

17:01

your phone Like say you're

17:03

on a plane or something you turn off Bluetooth Your

17:06

Apple watch will not disconnect even though that

17:08

is a Bluetooth connection because they have built

17:10

it specifically So that only

17:12

the Apple watch maintains its Bluetooth connection, even

17:14

if you turn off Blowing

17:17

my mind right now. This is this is a

17:19

breaking news I know there's new information So this

17:21

is one of the many ways that the DOJ

17:23

says that Apple has sort of unfairly tipped the

17:26

scales toward its own Accessories rather than you

17:28

know accessories made by other companies rascals. It's

17:30

giving rascals. Okay, so that's number four Yeah,

17:32

number five the last big complaint in the

17:34

DOJ's case against Apple is this issue of

17:37

digital wallets? Yes, this is one that you

17:39

I know gets your goat and I'll talk

17:41

about before so why don't you tell us

17:43

about this one? Yeah well So we talked

17:46

about it recently in the context of the

17:48

digital markets act in Europe and why might

17:50

that be a big deal? Where well over

17:52

there in your eyes are like fog Well,

17:56

we're talking at 1.5 X today All

18:00

our 3.0 listeners are gonna have to slow down to 2.8 this

18:02

week. So, yeah, over

18:04

there in Europe, they notice the same

18:06

thing, which is there is what they

18:08

call an NFC chip, that's near field

18:11

communication chip in your iPhone that lets

18:13

you make payments. So you can tap

18:15

your iPhone on many card readers and

18:17

just make a payment that way. And

18:19

why does Apple like keeping that NFC

18:21

chip to itself? Well, it is able

18:23

to put Apple Pay, and Apple

18:25

Pay takes a little fee for every

18:27

transaction that you are conducting. So that is

18:30

just essentially pure profit to them because they

18:32

have total control over the NFC chip in

18:34

your iPhone. There are many other payment services

18:36

that would love to build competitive services. Maybe

18:38

they could even build a cheaper service that

18:40

would take a smaller cut that would increase

18:42

prices for consumers less over time, but they

18:44

cannot do that. So the DOJ comes along

18:46

in this lawsuit and they says, Apple, you

18:49

gotta knock it off. This is anti-competitive. You

18:51

need to open up access to that chip.

18:53

Right. So let's talk about what we think

18:55

about this lawsuit. But first, let's just say

18:57

Apple obviously does not agree with

18:59

the DOJ and the state's here. Did

19:01

they issue a statement, Kevin? They sure

19:04

did. What did they say? They say

19:06

they plan to vigorously fight this lawsuit.

19:08

And Apple spokesperson said, quote, this

19:11

lawsuit threatens who we are and

19:13

the principles that set Apple products

19:15

apart in fiercely competitive markets. If

19:17

successful, it would hinder our ability

19:19

to create the kind of technology

19:21

people expect from Apple where hardware,

19:23

software and services intersect. It would

19:25

also set a dangerous precedent, empowering

19:27

government to take a heavy hand

19:29

in designing people's technology. So

19:31

that is what Apple has said. They will obviously

19:33

contest this. It will become probably a long drawn

19:35

out legal battle. But Casey, what

19:38

did you make of this complaint? Well, you know,

19:40

I mean, just in response to that comment from

19:42

Apple, I would say it does threaten who they

19:44

are because what they are is a monopolist. And

19:47

the DOJ is now coming after them to say

19:49

we should live in more of a duopoly or

19:51

a triopoly situation. And maybe that would be better.

19:53

But look, I on the

19:56

whole, I think this lawsuit is

19:58

smart. I do not think it takes a very heavy

20:00

hand in trying to redesign technology. It mostly

20:02

is looking at a bunch of software that

20:04

Apple is keeping to itself. And it's saying

20:07

you have to open that up to other

20:09

people. Would it really be terrible for Apple

20:11

if there were smart watches as good as

20:13

the Apple watch? I think

20:15

it would probably be fine. Would

20:17

it be terrible for Apple if

20:19

messaging from Android to iOS and

20:21

vice versa was as good as

20:23

messaging between iMessage and iMessage? It

20:25

would be fine. Maybe they have

20:27

to compete on some new dimension,

20:30

but cry me a river if that's what

20:33

you're really going to complain about. I

20:35

think there are elements of this lawsuit that are maybe a

20:37

little weaker that we can talk about, but on the whole, I

20:39

was very excited to read this. What do you think the

20:41

strongest and weakest parts of it were? I

20:44

think the NFC chip argument for the digital wallets,

20:46

I just think, is very strong. They built a

20:48

technology. It's powerful. It is essentially pure profit to

20:51

them. They keep it to themselves. There's no reason

20:53

why that shouldn't be opened up. Europe has already

20:55

come to the same conclusion. I think this is

20:57

just a place where Apple is going to have

21:00

to give. So I think that's probably the strongest part

21:02

of the lawsuit. I mean, you could argue that the

21:04

cloud streaming games part of the lawsuit is the strongest

21:06

because Apple has already conceded the point. But those

21:09

are the two for me. I think there is a

21:12

pretty good case that Apple should sort of play more

21:14

politely with messaging apps than it does, although how exactly

21:16

you design that, I don't necessarily have a strong point

21:18

of view on that. I think it's really only the

21:20

super app part of the complaint that I'm not as

21:22

on board with. And why do you think the super

21:24

app part of the complaint is weak? Basically

21:27

because I think that if you're going to

21:29

be an app store, be an app store.

21:31

I think if you are going to be

21:33

an app that also contains some infinite amount

21:35

of other apps, it just becomes really hard

21:37

for Apple to police what is on it.

21:39

I do want Apple to have some control

21:41

over what is on its phone. There

21:44

are benefits to the consumer of there being an

21:46

app store where Apple is doing some review. I

21:48

do think that that is true. So my preferred

21:50

solution here is yes, if you want to install

21:52

a third party app store, go for it. And

21:55

Apple can show you some scary warnings and it

21:57

can stamp its feet and say you're sort of

21:59

heading into I actually think all of

22:01

that is fine, but then at least you've sort of been warned

22:04

if the DOJ is gonna say to Apple like You

22:06

know face. I mean Facebook is a bad example

22:08

I think tick-tock, you know all of a sudden

22:10

just has like a million different apps in it

22:13

and half of them are from the Chinese Communist

22:15

Party, you know like like You remember just spying

22:17

on your location at all times like Apple You

22:19

know Apple is not in a great position to

22:21

be able to understand that and police that so,

22:23

you know super apps I don't assume again There

22:26

is really one super app in the world we

22:28

chat and I truly do not care how it's

22:30

doing I buy that I think the point you

22:32

made about the sort of concessions that Apple has

22:34

already made sort of indicating which parts of this

22:36

they think they Will have the hardest time defending

22:39

are good Which would be the cloud streaming games

22:41

which they've kind of already conceded and said that

22:43

they're gonna let cloud streaming games with

22:45

mini games inside them into the App Store

22:47

and this issue of Messaging and the green

22:50

bubble phenomenon and RCS like that That is

22:52

something that I feel like they've already budged

22:54

on which to me indicates that their lawyers

22:56

don't feel confident that they could defend That

22:58

one in court So I I

23:00

know that you are a fan of the

23:02

lawsuit and this aggressive approach to antitrust enforcement

23:04

against Apple Let's try

23:07

to sort of steel man apples side here

23:09

because I think there are a lot of

23:11

people Including you know many people who do

23:13

not work for the Apple corporation who feel

23:15

like this is all a little much from

23:17

the government Yeah, and I think people at

23:19

Apple will say look we built

23:21

the iPhone You know other companies if

23:23

they want to control their own app

23:26

stores and have you know Have lock-in

23:28

effects for their own accessories and their

23:30

own hardware like go build a better

23:32

phone Basically our sin in

23:34

the eyes of the government for you know I'm

23:36

now an Apple executive talking is

23:38

that we built the best phone in the

23:40

world billions of people have bought them and

23:44

We have made that the best phone in part

23:46

because we have can tightly control our ecosystem You

23:48

know you can buy an iPhone and you know

23:50

you're not gonna get malware loaded on to

23:52

it You know that it's gonna be up

23:54

to a certain standard for privacy All

23:57

these things that regulators now say are evil

24:00

are actually us just serving our customers and

24:02

giving them the best phone on the market.

24:05

And I think there's

24:07

some truth to that. Like I am an

24:09

iPhone user, I'm a happy iPhone user, I've

24:11

tried switching to Android phones. It

24:13

was not a great experience, and it was not

24:16

just because of all the sort of switching costs

24:18

and all the things that Apple makes difficult about

24:20

switching costs, it's also because the iPhone is just

24:22

a good product. And so I

24:24

think if you're more inclined to take Apple's side

24:26

of this, you might just say, look, all these

24:28

things, they look nefarious from

24:31

the perspective of a 2024 antitrust regulator,

24:33

looking at this dominant company that is

24:35

worth trillions of dollars, that has made

24:37

the most popular smartphone in the world

24:39

for years, and that has enjoyed reaping

24:41

the profits of that. But

24:44

you have to remember that we're in this position

24:46

because they built a really good phone. The iPhone

24:48

is a really good phone, has been a really

24:51

good phone for a really long time, and Apple

24:53

gets to make the rules about what does and

24:55

doesn't work well on iPhone, because it built the

24:57

frickin' phone. And I appreciate

24:59

what you're saying, but at the same time,

25:01

the argument here, Kevin, is that Apple is

25:04

harming consumers in this way, that yes, it

25:06

is a better experience compared to the null

25:08

case, the smartphone that doesn't exist, but it

25:10

would be a better phone if Apple didn't

25:13

put all of these unnecessary restrictions in

25:15

place. It would be a better phone if

25:17

people could put other payment solutions on it.

25:19

It would be a better phone if Android

25:22

and iOS messengers got along better, right? So

25:24

I think that is an argument here. Also,

25:26

look, there are very high costs to develop

25:28

a new smartphone platform from scratch. That is

25:31

actually a barrier to entry. There are network

25:33

effects on the iPhone between iOS users that,

25:35

as the lawsuit makes the case, Apple has

25:37

worked overtime to protect, right? So Apple has

25:40

worked to put all of these barriers in

25:42

place to ensure that no other smartphone platform

25:44

comes along, and that's my response to your

25:47

comment. Okay, so what happens now? Apple

25:49

will clearly get to respond to this

25:51

case. It may go to trial.

25:54

We don't know yet what's going to happen

25:56

in this. I guess they

25:58

could conceivably settle, likely that

26:00

is at this point. But what

26:02

do you think the next steps are? Yeah, I mean,

26:04

I think we're going to see something similar to what

26:07

we saw in the Google antitrust trial, where there will

26:09

be a long ramp up to this, right? I cannot

26:11

imagine that this will go to trial even within the

26:13

next year. And

26:15

even after the decision comes down, it will

26:18

almost certainly be appealed. So we're sort of

26:20

a long way away, but, you know, lest

26:23

you be disappointed by that, keep in

26:25

mind that this lawsuit exists in a

26:27

broader context. And the context is everything

26:30

that is happening in Europe and in other sort

26:32

of big countries around the world where their

26:35

own antitrust and competition watchdogs are coming in

26:37

and saying, Apple, you have had

26:40

a great run here, but it's time

26:42

to come back down to earth and

26:44

open up yourself to competition. Yeah, and

26:46

I would just say my biggest takeaway

26:49

from watching this Apple lawsuit in the

26:51

context of all these other antitrust lawsuits

26:53

that we've seen in the US and

26:55

Europe against the big tech companies

26:58

is that elections have consequences, right? None

27:00

of this would be happening under a second,

27:03

you know, Trump administration. This is only

27:05

happening because Joe Biden got elected and

27:07

brought in Lena Khan

27:09

and Jonathan Cantor and all

27:11

of these folks that we've talked about. And all

27:14

these hard forecasts. And all these hard forecasts, yes,

27:16

to lead a vigorous and aggressive antitrust campaign against

27:18

the big tech companies, whether that's a good thing

27:20

or a bad thing remains to be seen, but

27:22

I think it's definitely something that would not have

27:24

happened without a sea change in the political leadership

27:26

of this country. Unless Apple had said something to

27:28

upset Donald Trump, in which case, yes, the

27:30

Inaudiologist Department would have filed an even crazier

27:33

lawsuit. Right, okay, so that's the Apple lawsuit.

27:35

And we'll see you in court. When

27:40

we come back, Jonathan Heisler has smart

27:42

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29:34

So Casey we talked a lot

29:36

on this show about technology and

29:38

kids and specifically some

29:40

of the ways that social

29:42

media and smartphones may be

29:44

contributing to problems with adolescent

29:46

mental health, things

29:48

like body image issues among teenage

29:51

girls, and some of the legislation and

29:53

the efforts that governments are making

29:55

to make social media safer for kids.

29:57

I would say there is like

29:59

almost... panic in this country right

30:01

now about the intersection of young people

30:04

and technology. We've seen so many laws

30:06

passed around the country. This is something

30:08

that President Biden is super interested in

30:10

and so yeah this is kind of

30:12

a hot topic right now in this

30:15

country. Totally. This has been a huge

30:17

topic not just among journalists and parents

30:19

but also among state legislatures. There are

30:21

all these efforts trying to ban apps

30:23

or get them to change in some

30:26

way to raise the limit for some

30:28

social media platforms. There was a Surgeon

30:30

General's report last year that looked at

30:32

the detrimental effects of social media on

30:34

adolescent mental health and I

30:36

would say this is just one of the

30:39

topics that people care most about when it

30:41

comes to technology. I am constantly being asked

30:43

by parents, by people who worry about the

30:45

effects of smartphones and social media on their

30:47

kids like what do I do and

30:49

today I want to actually have a

30:51

conversation with someone who's been thinking about

30:53

this issue for a lot longer than

30:55

either of us have. Jonathan Haidt is

30:57

a social psychologist at NYU Stern School

30:59

of Business. Jonathan has been

31:01

looking at issues of smartphones and

31:03

social media and adolescent mental health

31:06

for many years. He's written a

31:08

lot of very popular pieces

31:10

about this subject and he has a

31:12

new book out called The Anxious Generation,

31:14

how the great rewiring of children is

31:17

causing an epidemic of mental illness. And

31:19

something I really appreciate about Jonathan is

31:21

that he does his work in public

31:23

as he has been gathering this data.

31:26

He's put together these public Google Docs

31:28

that have listed essentially every study on

31:30

the subject that he and his colleagues can

31:32

find and they've really sort of said hey

31:35

you get in there you look at the

31:37

data yourself you push on it and they've

31:39

continually synthesized that and refined that and they're

31:41

trying to answer all of the objections that

31:44

people have to the conclusions that they've drawn.

31:46

It's a really impressive piece of scholarship. Yeah

31:48

and what I like about Jonathan's work is

31:50

that he's not just trying to diagnose the

31:53

problems or attach blame to certain apps or

31:55

certain companies for ruining the mental health of

31:57

a generation. He's also talking about how how

32:00

we can fix this, how we can

32:02

make children happier, how we can create

32:04

the conditions for them to live happy

32:06

and successful lives, and how we ultimately

32:08

create a better future for society. So

32:10

let's bring in Jonathan Haidt. Jonathan

32:13

Haidt, welcome to Hard Fork.

32:16

Thank you, Kevin, thank you, Casey.

32:19

Hey. So

32:22

you've got this new book out, which I've been reading. It's

32:29

really compelling. And I want to just

32:31

start today by talking about the problem

32:33

that you have identified. You

32:35

argue in this book that kids born after 1995,

32:39

so people who are roughly in their 20s,

32:42

have experienced a totally

32:44

transformed childhood marked

32:47

by a rise in depression, anxiety,

32:49

and self-harm. And in your

32:51

book, you hone in on the early 2010s as

32:54

this kind of key inflection point when

32:56

smartphones were becoming popular and social

32:58

media was growing, and

33:00

childhood changed in response. What were

33:02

some of the key changes or

33:05

products or features within products that

33:07

you think produced the

33:09

most harmful effects on kids starting

33:11

in roughly the early 2010s? Sure.

33:15

So the early internet was amazing,

33:17

fun. Early social media was amazing,

33:19

fun. MySpace, early Facebook,

33:22

you put up your page. Someone

33:24

has their page. You can now see

33:26

their page. There's

33:28

no newsfeed. There's very

33:30

little virality. There's no share or like

33:32

button. There's no retweet. That's the

33:34

way it was early on. And those things were

33:36

called social networking systems. And

33:39

what's wrong with social networking? It's

33:41

good to connect people. The telephone

33:44

connected us all, and that was

33:46

amazing. But what I learned, so again, I'm not

33:48

a technologist. I'm a social psychologist. But I teamed

33:50

up with Tobias Rose Stockwell, who has a great

33:52

book out called Outrage Machine. It was through Tobias

33:55

that I learned the whole history and

33:57

retweet buttons came in, which gave the

33:59

platform. so much information that now

34:01

they could really algorithmicize the newsfeed, everything

34:03

becomes about the newsfeed. It's

34:06

no longer about looking at your friend's

34:08

dog photos. It now is about commenting

34:10

on the outrage thing that your friend

34:12

posted that he heard from someone else.

34:15

And so the very nature of life online

34:17

changes. And now we

34:19

begin calling them social media platforms.

34:22

It's a platform you stand on to perform

34:25

at other people. This is not healthy, especially

34:27

for kids. Oh, the other technological piece, I

34:29

forgot to mention, front facing camera 2010. Before

34:32

then, it wasn't all about selfies. Because you had to remember, I mean,

34:34

you guys, yeah, you're old enough. You remember you had to turn the

34:36

camera around to do a selfie. You had a guess, and then you

34:39

look, oh, I chopped off your head. 2010,

34:41

it becomes really easy to take selfies. That's right

34:43

when Instagram comes out. 2012, Facebook

34:45

buys Instagram. So that's really the transitional year.

34:48

Yeah, I think for me, the part that

34:50

feels new starting around that time and that

34:52

does feel like a sea change is

34:55

the ability to discreetly quantify how popular

34:57

or unpopular you are or things that you're

34:59

doing are. It's not just that people can

35:02

take selfies. It's that people can effectively vote

35:04

on whose selfies are the best through like

35:06

counts and things like that. And

35:08

as someone who was an adolescent

35:11

and struggled to figure

35:13

out, am I part of the cool crowd? Are

35:16

there people having parties that I'm not invited

35:18

to? It would have been, I think, very

35:20

detrimental to my mental health to be able

35:22

to see in real time a number that

35:24

signified how unpopular I was. Exactly.

35:27

In part, I buy that. But part of

35:29

me still struggles with the idea that because

35:31

there's like a number under an Instagram post,

35:33

childhood is being rewired. But I know there's

35:35

been a lot of research on this subject,

35:38

Jonathan. So what kind of empirical research has

35:40

been done to support some of these ideas?

35:42

OK, let's get into the causality. I was hoping

35:45

you guys would actually ask about this, because nobody

35:47

else does. Because I assume you allow us to

35:49

get geeky here. We can talk about the correlation

35:51

coefficients. OK. So to put this

35:53

in a narrative context, in 2018, I

35:56

started a Google Doc where I put every study

35:58

I could find, because the studies are all over

36:00

the place and people cite one, but

36:02

what about this one? So I put

36:04

them all together in a Google Doc.

36:06

If you go to jonathanhite.com/reviews, you

36:08

can find I have all these Google Docs. And

36:10

it turns out there's three kinds of studies. There

36:13

are correlational studies, there are longitudinal studies where you

36:15

take measurements over time and you see if you

36:17

know if change in time one predicts change in

36:19

time two. And then there are true

36:21

experiments. That's the third type. So you'll see in

36:23

that we've got hundreds of studies, the

36:25

correlate and let me just go through them if you don't mind.

36:27

Yeah, because this is the geeky part. Because

36:30

it's a debate Gene Twangy and I are on

36:33

one side saying that the evidence of causality is

36:35

pretty solid. And then there are about four or

36:37

five other researchers who are saying like, no, you

36:39

know, it's not solid. So it's a normal academic

36:41

debate. There's the way things work. There

36:44

are I forget, like, you know, 100 correlational

36:46

studies and they almost all find

36:48

a correlation. Now the argument is

36:50

from the skeptics, sometimes the correlation

36:53

is like point oh two, you know, point

36:55

oh four, that really is zero. I agree

36:57

with that. But here's the thing. Once

37:01

I began really going through the specific

37:03

studies, and especially the meta analyses, what

37:05

I found is that the ones that

37:07

get zero are the ones that look

37:09

at all screens, including television, and all

37:11

kids, including boys. But

37:14

whenever, whenever you can zoom in on

37:16

girls and social media, you always get

37:18

a much larger correlation. That's

37:20

just correlation that doesn't show causation. Then

37:23

there are also longitudinal studies where you track the same

37:25

kids over time and you see if

37:27

an increase in social media use at

37:29

time one predicts an increase in mental

37:31

illness or depression, especially at time two.

37:34

And the answer is yes, not

37:36

all studies show it. But the ones that don't show it

37:38

are the ones that just took measurements like every day, because

37:41

it takes a while to overcome to

37:43

detox from social media. So the studies

37:45

that waited at least a month between

37:47

measurements, the great majority do show what

37:49

looks like a causal effect. But

37:51

the gold standard in social science is

37:54

an experiment with random assignments. So an

37:56

RCT, random randomized control trial. And

37:59

there we We've collected about 25 of

38:01

them, and the great majority of them find

38:03

a causal effect. If you take people off

38:05

of social media experimentally, randomly assign people to

38:07

go off for a month, you generally find

38:10

their mental health improves. If

38:12

you put girls and young women

38:14

into a situation where they look at stuff like

38:16

on Instagram, it makes them more anxious about their

38:18

bodies. These are experiments, not correlational. So

38:20

people who say, oh, it's just correlation. Well, I don't

38:23

know what more I can do. We've

38:25

organized all the correlational studies, and the correlations

38:27

are not huge, but they're very consistent. We've

38:31

organized the longitudinal studies. They generally show

38:33

an effect, and we've organized the experimental

38:35

studies. They show an effect. So I'm

38:37

just frustrated with this argument that, oh,

38:39

well, we just don't know. It's just

38:41

correlation. No, there's a lot of published

38:43

exponents, and they find an effect, most of them.

38:45

Right. I would say, though, that

38:48

this is not a settled area of science, and

38:50

every time I talk about these subjects with people

38:52

who either work in the tech industry or are

38:55

skeptical of some of the kinds of claims

38:57

that you and other researchers are making, they'll

38:59

bring up a few objections. And I want

39:02

to just run some of these by you

39:04

to get your take. Please. I'd

39:06

love to hear them. So one thing I

39:08

hear all the time is all

39:10

of these studies about adolescent mental health

39:12

and smartphones or social media, they're all

39:15

based on self-reported data, basically asking

39:17

teenagers when you use Instagram,

39:19

do you feel sadder or

39:21

happier? When you use

39:23

Facebook, do you feel more or

39:25

less socially isolated? That kind of thing.

39:29

And that essentially, people

39:31

are unreliable narrators of their own

39:33

experience. And furthermore, that

39:35

there may be a cultural explanation

39:37

that we've destigmatized talking about mental

39:39

health over the past decade or

39:42

two to the point that now

39:44

kids and teens may be more

39:46

willing to admit that they're having

39:48

mental health problems than millennials or

39:50

Gen X or even people before

39:52

that. So what do you make

39:54

of this, the self-reported nature of

39:56

this data combined with

39:58

the sort of cultural acceptance? acceptance of

40:01

mental health as a thing that can be

40:03

talked about openly creates an

40:05

imperfect data set. Those are

40:07

both very valid objections. And this

40:09

is why none of us really trust correlational studies.

40:12

Correlational studies are notoriously unreliable. They're just

40:14

a starting point. Okay, but that's where most

40:17

of the research is. On your point about

40:19

being more willing to admit it, that would

40:21

be a great objection if we saw a gap

40:23

between the self-report data and the behavioral data, but

40:25

we don't. So suppose you saw all

40:27

these graphs going up. My book is full of them.

40:29

The goal is that everybody listening to this would have

40:31

seen these graphs. These are the graphs

40:33

showing a rise in teen mental health problems

40:36

starting around 2010. That's

40:38

right. That's right. I don't actually have

40:40

to draw graphs. All I have to do is buy

40:42

a hockey stick, hold it up, and that's it. You

40:44

get hockey sticks for self-reports of depression, anxiety, self-harm.

40:49

And if that was the case, but the lines for hospitalizations

40:53

and for suicide, if those lines were flat, then

40:55

you'd say, see? The

40:58

kids are saying they're more depressed, but actually, they're not going

41:00

to the hospital more often, but they are. In

41:02

fact, the graphs are just as sharp, and

41:04

it's the same pattern. It's especially the girls.

41:07

And guess what? It's not just the

41:09

U.S. It's the same pattern in Canada, the

41:11

U.K., Australia, New Zealand. We've

41:13

got data, similar things happening in Scandinavia, and it

41:15

all starts in the early 2010s. So

41:18

you can't point to any trend in the U.S. and

41:20

say, this is why girls in New Zealand are

41:22

suddenly checking into hospitals with bleeding thighs. Right.

41:25

Okay. So hit me with another one.

41:27

So what's your next objection? Here's another objection, and then I'll

41:30

let Casey jump in. Another objection

41:32

I hear is the kind of

41:34

not all screen time objection. Basically,

41:36

people will point to certain studies

41:38

and say, well, people

41:40

are painting with a broad brush when they say

41:42

that all smartphones are bad for kids or all

41:44

social media is bad for kids. It

41:46

really matters what kids are doing on

41:49

their smartphones and social media. Facebook,

41:51

for example, likes to

41:53

tout these studies that show that people

41:56

who just passively consume content, you know,

41:58

scrolling through a feed. do

42:00

report feeling less happy as a result

42:02

of using social media, but if people

42:04

are actually being active, if they're commenting,

42:07

if they're connecting with friends, if they're

42:09

creating things on social media, that is

42:11

correlated with more positive experience. What do

42:13

you make of this not all screen

42:15

time argument? Yeah, yeah. Sure, that's true.

42:18

That's fine. TV is fine. Stories

42:22

are fine. Long

42:24

form stories, we get into it.

42:26

We lose ourselves. It's a

42:29

narrative. It's like reading a book. It's a

42:31

little different from reading a book, but it's similar. You're going through

42:33

stories. Let me just give you

42:35

an example. Whereas the short form video,

42:37

especially pioneered by TikTok, and now Instagram

42:39

Reels and YouTube Shorts, this

42:42

is what I think is really bad. This

42:44

is so new, we don't have good data on it, but I

42:46

think this is probably worse even than Instagram. It's

42:49

quick. It's addictive. It's

42:51

quick reinforcement. It puts you into this

42:53

soporific mesmerized zone like a gambler at

42:56

a slot machine. It's

42:58

just a little thought experiment. I

43:02

ask my students at NYU, I teach

43:05

an undergraduate class called Flourishing in the business school

43:07

here. I say, how many of

43:09

you watch Netflix at least once

43:11

a week? Almost all hands go up.

43:14

How many of you wish that Netflix was never invented? Nobody.

43:17

Nobody is like, God damn it, Netflix is ruining my

43:19

life. Then I say, how

43:21

many of you watch TikTok at least once a week? Not

43:24

every, but almost all hands go up. How many

43:26

of you wish TikTok was never invented? Most

43:29

hands go up. That's not just

43:31

me and 35 students. I

43:33

asked them that because there was a study

43:35

published last fall by a professor at University

43:37

of Chicago, Leonardo Bersten. They said,

43:39

how much would we have to pay you, the two college

43:41

students, to get off of Instagram for a month or TikTok

43:43

for a month? It's like $50, $60, something like that. Then

43:47

they said, suppose we were to arrange it. We're trying to arrange

43:50

it. Everyone in your school is going to go off for a

43:52

month. How much would we have to pay

43:54

you to join them in going off? The

43:56

scale allowed them to say negative numbers or whatever it

43:58

was. Most people said

44:00

they would pay to have that happen. They would pay

44:02

money to be freed from TikTok for a month if

44:05

everyone else was off it. Of course, if everyone's on

44:07

it, you have to be on it. So

44:09

yes, it matters what you're doing. And some

44:12

things like watching Netflix, that counts as screen

44:14

time, and there's no harm in that. But

44:17

they make a second point about how

44:19

it matters. Everyone focuses on the

44:21

content. What are you doing? What

44:23

are you watching? Those Senate hearings was all about, can't we

44:25

get, if we could just cut self-harm

44:29

stuff and suicide

44:31

promoting stuff, if we could just cut

44:34

it down by 90%, wouldn't the kids

44:36

be okay? Like, no, it's

44:38

not, this is what we learned from Marshall McLuhan

44:40

and Neil Postman, all the great media theorists in

44:42

the 20th century. McLuhan said

44:44

the medium is the message. It's

44:47

not just what you're watching.

44:49

It's you're now spending your whole

44:51

life scrolling and working on

44:53

a screen. So even if the

44:55

screen itself is not harmful, when

44:58

life is no longer active, it's no

45:00

longer involves other people, the kids are

45:02

not spending much time with their friends.

45:04

After school, you have to go home

45:06

to your own house if you wanna play video games. You can't

45:08

go over to a friend's house to play video games. You need

45:10

your own control, your own headset. So you

45:13

can tell me that there are different

45:15

screen activities that are better and worse, and I'll agree with

45:17

that. But I'll still say, no matter what menu you wanna

45:20

come up with, if we're talking nine hours

45:22

a day, which is what it is for American kids, around

45:24

nine hours a day average, outside

45:26

of school, not counting homework, that

45:29

pushes out everything else. So a screen-based

45:31

life is still gonna be bad, even

45:34

if you fill it with the nicer

45:36

parts of screen-based life. This

45:38

is why I really appreciate talking to you

45:40

because I think you do challenge a lot

45:42

of my assumptions. I mean, let me speak

45:44

up for some positive things that I

45:46

think we've experienced because of social media.

45:48

I do think that it has accelerated

45:50

a lot of progressive social movements. I

45:52

think it accelerated me too. Black Lives

45:55

Matter, LGBT equality, right? I think that,

45:57

you know, I'm gay. If you're an

45:59

LGBT team, and you live in a family

46:01

that's not supportive, but you're able to hop onto Instagram

46:03

or Reddit or YouTube and see people like you telling

46:05

you that you're okay and it's gonna get better, I

46:07

think that that could have a positive effect on your

46:09

life. I also understand that we're

46:12

gonna have just different outcomes based on

46:14

different individual psychologies, but I think because

46:16

my own lived experience has been one

46:18

where social media has benefited me, I

46:20

would say, both personally and in my

46:22

career, I struggle to accept the reality

46:24

of what you're saying, which is that

46:26

for much younger people kind of growing

46:29

up in different circumstances that this may

46:31

have been a net negative. Well,

46:33

in this case, I think, let me suggest that

46:36

you might be mixing up the

46:38

internet and social media. So let me

46:40

try, this is a little thing I sometimes do when I speak

46:42

in public. Say, let's imagine we're back in

46:44

the early 90s and a genie

46:47

comes to you and the genie has

46:49

three boxes. They're glowing boxes floating in

46:51

space. And the genie says,

46:53

if you open any box, you're

46:55

gonna get the thing inside. And it's gonna take

46:57

about 10, 15 hours a week of your time.

47:00

So he opens the first box. It's the internet.

47:03

It's a web browser. What do you think? Are

47:05

you glad we opened that box? Yes. Everyone

47:08

is. So I've done this in a large audience. Everyone's

47:11

glad we have the internet. Nobody wants to get to the internet.

47:13

Okay, here comes the second box. You're already spending 15 hours

47:16

a week on the internet. Here comes the

47:18

second box. You open it up, it's a glowing iPhone. Do

47:21

you want the iPhone or do you wanna stick with your flip phone? What

47:23

would you say, Casey? You're glad we have iPhones?

47:25

I would take the iPhone, yeah. Almost everyone would.

47:27

The iPhone is amazing. I love my iPhone. Okay,

47:30

so now you've got the internet and an iPhone

47:33

and you can get the world's knowledge and

47:35

you can watch videos and you can

47:37

communicate with people and you can go to all kinds

47:40

of, you know, you can get, you know, if you're

47:42

a gay isolated kid in Montana, you are now connected

47:44

to everybody. Okay, now we have

47:46

the third box. We open it up. It's

47:48

Facebook and all the other platforms. So

47:51

you're already spending now 30 hours a week on internet and

47:53

your iPhone. Do you wanna spend another 15 ever or do

47:56

you wanna spend more time on social media? Yeah,

48:00

in addition Casey. Are you glad we opened that box to

48:02

you? Are you glad that we have that or do you

48:05

wish maybe we left That one closed well I would draw

48:07

a distinction here because I think if the choices take Facebook

48:09

and Instagram for 15 hours a week I would probably say

48:11

no, that's not of interest to me But

48:14

when I did start spending 15 hours a

48:16

week on Twitter when Twitter was a thing

48:18

it did incredible things for me It helped

48:20

to get me jobs. It helped me to

48:23

network. It helped me to understand what was

48:25

happening in the world and And

48:27

you know so but but I don't I don't know

48:29

how Twitter would sort of fit into the equations

48:31

and you know presumably teenage girls Aren't mostly depressed because

48:34

of Twitter, but but to me to answer that question

48:36

I do have to drill in a little bit on

48:38

what social media we're talking about. Okay Well,

48:41

I'm talking about all of it the idea of

48:43

making it very easy for people to spread

48:46

viral content now, of course, there's a use

48:48

for that and When adults

48:50

want to use these platforms as a tool

48:52

to advance their goals whether they're political movement

48:54

goals, that's fine I'm not here to say

48:56

band platforms because they're hurting kids, but for

48:58

God's sakes I don't want my children especially

49:01

the age of 10 11 12

49:03

to be anywhere near these platforms

49:05

Tiktok is just so addictive. It

49:07

is warping their development. So

49:10

the costs are just enormous anyway, would

49:12

you agree with me that Social

49:14

media is just a different category from the

49:17

internet. I Agree,

49:19

I think it's probably primarily different

49:21

in speed, right? It sort of

49:23

gets more internet Do you mean faster but

49:25

but also, you know, there are those other

49:28

dynamics retweets, you know The sort of the number

49:30

counts that you know, but what's interesting Jonathan and

49:32

I wonder if you could speak to this Is

49:34

that if you ask teens they

49:36

largely say that they like social media for

49:38

not exactly you you cite not in your

49:40

well You cite in your book a Pew

49:42

report from last year that found

49:44

that 58% of teens report that social media

49:47

helps them feel more accepted 71%

49:50

see it as a creative outlet and 80% Felt

49:52

more in touch with their friends lives as a

49:54

result of social media. So so what do you

49:56

make of the disconnect there? Well

49:58

when you talk to Harry heroin addicts and you say,

50:01

how do you feel when you take heroin? They say,

50:03

it makes me feel great. But

50:05

then you stop taking it, you're in withdrawal. And

50:07

in the same way, what happened to

50:09

teens when they went on these platforms? What

50:12

happened was their time with actually with their friends

50:14

plummets, it cuts by I think more than 50%.

50:18

It went from over two hours a day to less than an

50:20

hour a day for American teens is how much they spend with

50:22

their friends. And this was before COVID. So

50:25

it takes away real in-person interactions. And what

50:27

gives them is lots of

50:29

shallow interactions that are effortless, very,

50:31

very easy. And then you say

50:34

to teens, now first, let me point out, and

50:36

then once they make that move, they all

50:38

get much lonelier, not every single teen, but

50:40

on average, the loneliness epidemic really takes off

50:42

around 2012, 2013, especially for boys. So

50:46

all of a sudden, they're really lonely, because

50:48

they're not seeing other kids very much. Even

50:50

in school, they're not talking to other kids very much, because what

50:52

are you doing between classes? You pull out your phone, you're on

50:54

your phone checking between classes, and you sit down, you're

50:57

checking your texts while you're in class. So

51:00

kids are largely cut off from each other. And

51:02

the only way they can connect is on these social media

51:04

platforms. And then a researcher from Meta

51:06

comes along and says, what do you

51:08

think? Do you like using social media? Yes,

51:11

it makes me feel more connected to my

51:13

friends, who I don't see anymore because of

51:15

you goddamn platform taking my friends away from

51:17

me. How about that? What

51:19

do you think? I

51:21

don't know. I think there's probably something to

51:23

be said for the fact that teens, you

51:26

know, what teens like doing is not always what's good for

51:28

them. And I'd say that as a

51:30

former teen who did things that were probably not good for me. But

51:33

it does strike me as a little bit of

51:35

a sort of like, I don't know, adults just

51:37

kind of thinking they know better than teens

51:39

about what's good for them. I disagree.

51:42

So look at it this way. If

51:44

you've gone back to when comic books, there was a

51:46

moral panic on comic books. If

51:49

we'd said to teens, you can't buy a comic book to a 21. Do

51:52

you think that some teens would have objected? Do you

51:54

think some teens would have actually written something?

51:56

And said like, no, don't do that. Yeah, they

51:58

would have. But now look at social media. with all

52:00

this talk about banning this, raising

52:02

the age, age limitations, taking kids

52:04

off of social media, you'd

52:07

think that there'd be some Gen

52:09

Z members saying, no, don't do it. I'm

52:11

looking. I've been looking. I have

52:14

a whole blog post on this. I put a Gen Z

52:16

research assistant on this. I said, Eli, go out and find

52:18

the other side. Find me Gen Z

52:20

arguing against limiting this stuff. Find me Gen Z

52:22

who say, actually, this stuff is good for us.

52:24

Find me some. He couldn't. There's

52:27

one woman in Canada who wrote an article.

52:29

I think it was basically just Casey's point.

52:32

Yeah, we need it for social movements. But

52:34

we literally cannot find Gen Z objecting to

52:36

it because, as in that bursting

52:38

article, yes, they're stuck on it. They're

52:41

on it because everyone else is on it. And if you

52:43

say to them, hey, how about if we take it away

52:45

from you, but we take it

52:47

from everyone, then they say, yes, sign me up.

52:49

Right. Right. It's

52:51

the collective problem. Collective action problem. Let's

52:54

say that we accept your premise that

52:57

social media and smartphones are the primary

52:59

culprit in these dramatic increases in teen

53:01

mental health problems. And I should say,

53:03

I largely do buy that argument. It's

53:05

one I've sort of wrestled with over

53:07

the years. But I think that is

53:09

the simplest and cleanest explanation. Let's

53:11

talk about what to do about

53:14

it. In your book, you advocate for

53:16

four reforms that you think could radically

53:18

transform this problem and start

53:20

to fix it. Lay those

53:23

four reforms out for us. Right. Sure.

53:26

Let me just preface it by saying my story is

53:28

not a simple-minded story about it being all smartphones and

53:30

social media. It's actually a two-part story about

53:32

the decline of the play-based childhood, where

53:34

we crack down on free play from

53:36

the 1980s, the milk cartons, the abducted

53:38

children, all that stuff. We don't let

53:40

our kids out. So we reduce

53:43

what they need, which is free play with

53:45

each other from the 80s through about 2010.

53:48

And then we bring in the phone-based childhood, the

53:51

great rewiring. So I can summarize

53:53

the whole book by saying we have overprotected

53:55

our children in the real world. We have

53:57

underprotected them online. And so what

53:59

are the solutions? to reverse that. We've got

54:01

to reverse both of those. So now the four norms.

54:05

The first norm is no smartphone before high

54:07

school. Just give the kids flip phones. Flip

54:09

phones are not harmful. The millennials were fine. The

54:12

second norm is no social media till 16. This

54:15

stuff is just shredding kids going through puberty,

54:17

but the millennials didn't get on Instagram and

54:19

other platforms until they were in college, and

54:22

they were not harmed by them as far as I can tell. And

54:25

the third norm is phone-free schools. When

54:28

kids are in school, their attention should be divided

54:30

between their teachers and their friends. But

54:33

if you take away half the time they're focusing on

54:35

the teacher and you take away half the time they're

54:37

focusing on their friends and you put it all on

54:39

the phones, why bother going to school? Right.

54:41

And you're not just saying like no smartphones

54:43

in the classroom during class, right? You're saying like,

54:45

which is a rule that I think most

54:47

schools have. You're saying like, do

54:50

not bring your phone to school or if you do, you have

54:53

to lock it away until the end of the day. Of

54:55

course, kids should be walking to school by

54:58

third or fourth grade. I'm very happy with

55:00

them to have a flip phone with

55:02

them if they're walking to school, let them be able to communicate

55:04

with their parents if they need to. But

55:06

yes, a phone-free school is one in which you

55:09

lock up the phone and anything that can text,

55:11

a smartwatch, anything, you lock it

55:13

up in a phone locker or a yonder pouch. That's the

55:15

only way to regain kids' attention. And what the kids themselves

55:18

say is they lock up their phone

55:20

for the first half hour. They're still thinking about the

55:22

drama, whatever it is, what's going on. It takes about

55:24

half an hour to get over it. And

55:26

then they find, oh, by the end of the

55:28

first period, they're actually with their

55:30

friends and they like it. And the teachers love it.

55:32

All the teachers hate the phones, all the principals hate

55:35

the phones. So that's what

55:37

I'm saying. We need to give the kids six hours

55:39

a day when they can talk to other people. The

55:42

fourth norm then is far more

55:46

independence, free play, and responsibility in

55:48

the real world. So those are

55:50

the four reforms. And the point

55:53

is that they are all solutions

55:55

to collective action problems. If

55:57

you are the only kid who doesn't have your phone at school, you're

55:59

allowed to do that. left out, what if the

56:01

school helps you out by saying, how about nobody has

56:03

their phone in school? Well, then it's great for everyone.

56:06

If you're the only parent who doesn't let your

56:08

kid have a smartphone when they start middle school,

56:11

that's the norm now. When you start middle school, you

56:13

got a phone, a smartphone. If you're the only one,

56:15

then your kid is isolated, cut off. I, you know,

56:17

everyone else is on Snapchat and I don't, I just

56:19

have a flip phone. But if

56:21

half the parents are delaying till high school,

56:23

well, then it's easy. So these

56:25

four norms are all solutions

56:27

to collective action problems. They

56:29

cost nothing whatsoever except for

56:31

some phone lockers. That's not very expensive. They

56:34

cause no harm. There's no

56:36

victim to these norms. They're

56:39

completely bipartisan, left and right, Republican, Democrat.

56:41

They're all very upset about what's happening

56:43

to their children and their constituents' children.

56:46

And they're all doable if we act together. One

56:50

technical question. When you say no social media

56:52

before 16, would that include watching YouTube from

56:54

your perspective? Yeah,

56:56

and I can't imagine banning, banning YouTube from

56:58

kids lives. YouTube is a very, very important

57:01

platform. So I do make a distinction between

57:05

viewing things and having an account. So

57:09

in terms of legislation, what

57:11

I favor is let's take COPPA, the Child

57:13

Online, Childhood Online Privacy Protection Act, which sets

57:15

a minimum age as 13, at which

57:18

a company can sign you up, take

57:21

your data, you don't need parents permission. I

57:24

can feed you stuff. I can, you know, I

57:26

can use algorithms on you and you can't sue

57:28

me. Your parents cannot sue me if I drive

57:30

you to suicide. That's our

57:32

current situation. What I'm saying is

57:34

not you can't watch YouTube.

57:36

I'm saying you can't open an account. You

57:39

can't open an account that allows you to post.

57:41

You can't open an account that gives them any

57:43

data. You can't open an account

57:45

so the algorithms get to know you. Now,

57:47

TikTok is so, so smart that even if

57:49

a kid just shows up without signing up

57:51

after an hour, it's going to actually get

57:54

to know them. I can't stop that. But

57:56

I do think that it's insane that we

57:58

let any night year old can open 30

58:00

accounts. I mean, there's nothing, there's no obstacle.

58:02

They just lie about their birthday and they're

58:05

in. That's completely insane. And I should be

58:07

illegal. I mean, how can these companies be

58:09

taking data from my kids without me even

58:11

knowing or agreeing? John,

58:14

in your book, one of the parts that I

58:16

found most interesting was the chapter on safetyism, what

58:18

you call safetyism, which is this idea that we've

58:21

sort of overprotected children in the real

58:23

world. You have these amazing photos of what playgrounds

58:25

used to look like, you

58:27

know, in previous decades. And they're like essentially

58:29

like metal death traps with like, you know,

58:32

children climbing, you know, scaling 20 feet in

58:34

the air. And now, you know,

58:36

you have this sort of like plastic things with

58:38

the rounded edges and you really can't hurt yourself

58:40

that badly. And we've sort of your argument of

58:42

is that that's sort of a metaphor for how

58:44

we've overprotected children in the physical world.

58:47

I'm curious about how you think about that when

58:49

it comes to the internet. Like I grew up

58:51

on the internet. I didn't have a smartphone, but

58:53

I had the internet. I had, you know, broadband

58:55

in my house growing up. And,

58:58

you know, my experience was a lot more like

59:00

the online version of one of those like, you

59:02

know, old playgrounds with the sharp edges and the

59:04

danger. I grew up

59:07

on a, you know, with not that many

59:09

rules surrounding my internet use. And

59:12

as a result, I kind of had to build

59:14

the resilience. I had to learn what was dangerous

59:16

and what wasn't on the internet. I was not

59:18

sort of being blocked in this

59:20

kind of abstinence based model by my parents.

59:23

And in fact, I had to sort of

59:25

make some mistakes and learn some tough lessons

59:27

along the way. But ultimately, I think it

59:29

helped make me a more savvy, educated user

59:31

of the internet in my adulthood. So I

59:34

do buy that these problems are correlated with

59:37

all these mental health challenges. But I also

59:39

worry that if you just block kids

59:42

from using social media, from using the

59:44

internet, from using smartphones, you miss a

59:46

chance to help educate them about how

59:48

to use these things safely and responsibly.

59:51

And I don't know, do you

59:53

worry about that too? No,

59:55

I see the apparent contradiction. But

59:57

two things. One is We

1:00:00

evolved to be anti-fragile. We

1:00:02

evolved to learn from experience. And

1:00:04

the experience is the kind of things our hunter-gatherer

1:00:06

ancestors did. That's

1:00:08

what kids most want to do. They want to

1:00:10

basically play predator-prey games. Sharks

1:00:12

and minnows, tag. So we have to

1:00:14

practice our predator avoidance skills, and we

1:00:17

have to practice our predation skills. They

1:00:19

have to deal with exclusion. They have to

1:00:21

learn as they get older. They now begin

1:00:23

doing gossip. They sometimes are embarrassed. They're sometimes

1:00:25

ashamed. Sometimes you say something, and

1:00:27

now all the people are laughing at you. It's

1:00:29

very painful. And so

1:00:31

you learn to control yourself. You learn to speak better. Now

1:00:34

let's say you took that model. You

1:00:36

said, well, it's the same online. No,

1:00:39

it's not. Something about being publicly

1:00:41

shamed on the internet, in which it's not just

1:00:43

the three people who overheard you. It's the entire

1:00:45

school is laughing at you and

1:00:47

adding comments, and it goes on for days.

1:00:50

This drives kids to suicide. I

1:00:52

ask students when I... This issue sometimes

1:00:54

comes up when I'm talking to high school or middle

1:00:56

school audiences. And I

1:00:59

say, how many of you have been publicly shamed in

1:01:01

some way? A lot of hands go up. How

1:01:05

many of you felt it makes you stronger, tougher? It

1:01:07

makes you not care what people think? Or

1:01:10

how many of you find it makes you gun shy? It makes

1:01:12

you more afraid to speak up? Most people

1:01:14

say it makes them gun shy. Being

1:01:16

publicly shamed is not like falling on the playground.

1:01:19

Falling on the playground is part of learning

1:01:21

to master your physical body and actually become

1:01:23

more outgoing physically. Whereas being publicly shamed, it

1:01:26

changes you. It makes you reticent, gun shy. I

1:01:28

mean, sound that to me. The few times I've

1:01:30

been at the center of a Twitter mob, it

1:01:32

really makes you super cautious. It doesn't make you

1:01:34

tougher. So yes, they need to

1:01:36

learn from experience. But I would

1:01:39

say also, kids need

1:01:41

to learn about sex. They need

1:01:43

to learn how to flirt. They need to

1:01:45

know how to seduce, resist seduction. So

1:01:47

why don't we start them when they're eight? I mean, let's give them a

1:01:49

head start. What if we said you

1:01:52

can't have sex till you're 18? How

1:01:54

could they ever learn it? No, let's start with them when they're

1:01:56

eight. That's better. Like, no, no,

1:01:58

there are developmental periods. There's no

1:02:00

there's no advantage to starting kids early. Well

1:02:03

to continue the sex analogy I mean we have

1:02:06

you know experimented with abstinence based education

1:02:08

in this country and We

1:02:11

found that it actually doesn't you know lead

1:02:13

to reductions in teen pregnancy and

1:02:15

things like that I mean we we do

1:02:17

educate kids about sex when it's an appropriate

1:02:19

age. So do you think there is some? Some

1:02:23

benefit to I don't know introducing this stuff in

1:02:25

a controlled way where it's not just like you

1:02:27

can't use social media You can't have a smartphone.

1:02:30

You're not old enough Is

1:02:32

there I guess I'm just looking for

1:02:34

like some something to tell the parents

1:02:36

who say well, you know I I don't know that

1:02:38

I want to go cold turkey. I don't know that

1:02:41

I want to come I get off from this stuff

1:02:43

All together. No, that's right. I'm not saying go cold

1:02:45

turkey. Here's what I'm saying. The internet

1:02:47

is amazing Kids,

1:02:49

you know, it's integrated into

1:02:52

so much teaching My

1:02:54

kids used a lot beginning in elementary school So

1:02:57

if kids are using the internet on their

1:02:59

parents computer on the family computer, you know

1:03:01

an hour a day For

1:03:04

school, whatever it is. That's great. They're gonna learn how

1:03:06

to use Google They're gonna learn that they can look

1:03:08

things up on YouTube So, you know

1:03:10

by all means exposed into the internet as I

1:03:13

said before the internet is not social media the

1:03:15

internet Yes, the internet has dangerous areas and you

1:03:17

do have to learn about some bad neighborhoods. That's

1:03:19

true So, you know,

1:03:21

I don't say that Oh, you know never let a kid on the

1:03:23

internet before they're 12 or 14 I

1:03:25

would never say that so they

1:03:28

have computers. They have laptops What I'm saying

1:03:30

is do not give a child an

1:03:32

elementary middle school. Do not give them

1:03:34

their own device which they can customize

1:03:37

Communicate with strangers on do fall

1:03:39

into rabbit holes Every waking

1:03:41

moment don't do that until at

1:03:43

least high school You can give

1:03:45

them a flip phone and you can give them a laptop

1:03:48

as long as access is limited You don't want them to

1:03:50

have the laptop in bed overnight. Mm-hmm You

1:03:53

write in your book about talking with Marcus Zuckerberg

1:03:55

in 2019 about some of these issues He had

1:03:57

called you up or emailed you or I don't

1:03:59

know how I got in touch, but he said, you

1:04:01

know, I want to talk with you because you you

1:04:03

might have some ideas that we could use to improve

1:04:05

our platforms. What was the

1:04:07

result of that conversation and and what have been

1:04:09

some of the results of the conversations that you've

1:04:11

had with other influential people who maybe in our

1:04:13

are in a position to fix or

1:04:15

improve some of these products? Yeah Some

1:04:18

you know my conversation with Zuckerberg was was

1:04:20

really interesting He his office emailed

1:04:22

me and said that Mark would like to talk with me

1:04:24

and this was at a time He was doing like a

1:04:26

he was traveling around the country. He was talking to all

1:04:28

sorts of people I mean, he's a brilliant

1:04:31

guy. He's very curious. You know, he wants to know

1:04:33

the arguments So we had a

1:04:35

conversation and I had my agenda was

1:04:37

especially to focus on underage use That

1:04:40

I thought this is something that he could clean up tomorrow

1:04:42

if he wanted to So that was my main agenda was

1:04:44

to try to get him to work on that and he

1:04:46

said oh But we don't allow people on under 13 and

1:04:49

I said, you know, Mark I just created an account of pretending

1:04:51

I was my 11 year old daughter

1:04:53

and there's no obstacle So

1:04:55

he said we're working on that we're working on that he

1:04:57

said that was August of 2019 that we that we spoke

1:05:01

So I don't think anything came of that I

1:05:03

do think from what I hear people high up

1:05:05

in meta and in some of these companies They

1:05:08

still believe that the research is

1:05:10

ambiguous So I don't think

1:05:13

that the company is willing to do anything

1:05:16

that would reduce its user base Redo

1:05:18

or slow its growth. So yes, they experimented with

1:05:20

project Daisy. It was called where they hid the

1:05:22

light counter Fine experiment with that. It's a small

1:05:24

thing. Maybe it would help it turns out it

1:05:27

didn't help How about eliminating

1:05:29

underage use like no way? No way are they

1:05:31

going to kick off 10 11 12

1:05:33

year olds because they need them Otherwise, they're just going to go to

1:05:35

tick-tock. So So

1:05:38

that's why I don't believe that meta in

1:05:40

particular Is going to

1:05:42

reform unless it's forced to by losing gigantic

1:05:44

class action or quasi class action lawsuits or

1:05:46

by legislation So I hold up very little

1:05:48

hope from meta Now most

1:05:51

people the great majority of people in tech

1:05:53

bear zero responsibility for this most of tech

1:05:55

is not about depressing kids It's

1:05:57

about all kinds of amazing innovations. So what

1:05:59

I'm hoping open. And maybe I can put the call out

1:06:01

here. Obviously, you know, this is very popular podcast in

1:06:03

the tech world. If you're in the

1:06:06

tech industry, and the entire country thinks that you're

1:06:08

killing kids, and most of you

1:06:10

are not like the great majority, you're just making amazing

1:06:12

products that are not hurting children at all. How

1:06:15

about you guys do something to police reputation? How

1:06:17

about you guys put some pressure on

1:06:19

meta in particular, also Snapchat, Snapchat

1:06:21

is more mixed, but it has

1:06:24

really harmful features. How about

1:06:26

you guys actually have some pride in your industry? You know,

1:06:28

we used to all be so proud of you, we thought

1:06:30

that you were the greatest American industry, you were a gift,

1:06:32

you know, God's gift to the earth. And now many of

1:06:34

us think you're a curse. Yeah, yeah.

1:06:38

Well, Jonathan, thank you. I really

1:06:41

enjoy your book. And I think listeners should

1:06:43

go out and check it out for

1:06:45

themselves. It's a very compelling argument backed

1:06:47

by just mountains of research. And

1:06:50

it is relevant to anyone with a kid out there

1:06:52

trying to navigate through the world of technology. So I

1:06:54

really appreciate your work. And I appreciate you coming on.

1:06:57

Well, thank you, Kevin. Thank you, Casey. I

1:06:59

hope people in the Bay Area and in

1:07:02

Los Angeles will be on the lookout for

1:07:04

our Gorilla Art Project, you'll be seeing billboards,

1:07:06

signs on the back of buses, things to

1:07:08

illustrate intuitively, what some of these platforms are

1:07:10

doing to kids. Thanks for having me

1:07:12

on. All right. All right. Thanks, Jonathan. This

1:07:32

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your dream car the convenient way. Well,

1:08:05

Casey, the second biggest tech news of

1:08:07

the week, I think just behind this

1:08:10

Apple lawsuit, was the IPO of Reddit.

1:08:12

Reddit, of course, is the big social

1:08:14

media site, the so-called front page of

1:08:16

the internet. That company went

1:08:18

public this week. It was listed on the New

1:08:21

York Stock Exchange. It priced

1:08:23

its shares at $34, implying a valuation of $6.4 billion for

1:08:25

the whole company. And it started

1:08:31

trading on Thursday under the

1:08:34

ticker symbol RDDT. Yeah, Reddit

1:08:36

lost $91 million last year.

1:08:38

And now you, the public, can get in on the

1:08:40

action. Right. So

1:08:42

there are some big winners in this

1:08:44

IPO. Obviously, Reddit executives and investors are

1:08:46

finally getting to cash out some of

1:08:48

their shares. Steve Huffman, the CEO of

1:08:50

Reddit and previous hard forecast owns about

1:08:52

3.3% of the company

1:08:55

that is now worth a whole bunch

1:08:57

of money. Also a big deal for

1:08:59

Conde Nast, the company that publishes magazines,

1:09:01

including Wired and the New Yorker. They

1:09:03

purchased Reddit in 2006 for $10 million

1:09:06

and their stake is now worth

1:09:09

more than a billion dollars. Wow.

1:09:11

And now that that's happened, that

1:09:13

might save up to one job

1:09:15

in journalism. That's true. So

1:09:18

actually, one of the other winners that I did not know

1:09:20

was going to be a winner. This IPO was Sam Altman,

1:09:22

who seems to have his hands in every

1:09:24

pie in Silicon Valley. He owns 8.7% of Reddit

1:09:26

and is going to make a bunch of money

1:09:28

from this IPO as well.

1:09:31

Well, nice to see him catch a break. So

1:09:34

let's talk about the IPO, but let's just talk about

1:09:36

like first why we're talking about this because

1:09:38

Reddit is not the biggest or most profitable

1:09:41

company online. It is not

1:09:43

a company we talked about a ton on

1:09:45

this show. So why do you care about

1:09:47

this IPO? So to me, Reddit is symbolic

1:09:49

of a version of the

1:09:52

internet that I really like. It's

1:09:54

a place where real people come

1:09:56

together to share their expertise, to

1:09:58

talk about their passions. and

1:10:00

to do it in these niche communities

1:10:02

that are often really fun to be

1:10:04

in. And they're fun to be in

1:10:06

because unlike a TikTok or a Facebook

1:10:08

or an Instagram where every single person

1:10:10

on earth is just kind of forced

1:10:12

to share one feed, on Reddit you

1:10:14

can just kind of go and find

1:10:16

your people. You can find

1:10:19

the people who want to see oddly

1:10:21

satisfying things, or who only want to

1:10:23

talk about the NBA, or who need

1:10:25

a really good review of a dishwasher.

1:10:29

And it matters to me because

1:10:31

if Reddit cannot

1:10:33

succeed in building that business

1:10:35

and making that sustainable, it

1:10:37

sort of makes me wonder who can. We

1:10:40

talk so much on this show about

1:10:42

artificial intelligence, how we think it is

1:10:45

gonna change the web. We talk about

1:10:47

the concentration of power into the hands

1:10:49

of such a few number of these

1:10:51

giant companies and there are precious few

1:10:54

of these little baby platforms that

1:10:56

have been around forever that have

1:10:58

tens of millions of users and

1:11:00

are still trying to figure out how

1:11:02

do we make this a sustainable thing.

1:11:04

So to me that's the real drama

1:11:06

of the Reddit story and why I

1:11:08

want to talk about it today because

1:11:10

if Reddit can make it,

1:11:12

maybe this kind of human-centric internet still

1:11:15

has a chance and if it can't,

1:11:17

it leaves me worried. Totally, I totally

1:11:19

agree. I think Reddit is one of

1:11:21

the last relics of the open web

1:11:24

that we still see today. There's a

1:11:26

reason that many people, myself included, put

1:11:29

reddit.com at the end of our Google

1:11:31

searches when we want to find a review for

1:11:33

a new toaster or some parenting advice or whatever

1:11:35

it is. That is

1:11:37

the way that you find content that is

1:11:39

made by humans who might know what they're

1:11:41

talking about who are posting it on a

1:11:43

place for people who share similar interests. It

1:11:46

is very hard to actually find that stuff

1:11:48

outside of Reddit and so I am very

1:11:50

grateful that Reddit still exists and I'm rooting

1:11:52

for it if only because I think you're

1:11:54

right. It is symbolic of this era in

1:11:56

the internet where you had these niche communities.

1:12:00

didn't have to use like algorithmic ranking

1:12:02

to like juice engagement. It wasn't

1:12:04

like basically the machines deciding what

1:12:06

people see it was people deciding

1:12:08

what to show each other. It

1:12:10

really is interesting that you can

1:12:12

almost divide the internet into two.

1:12:14

There is the sort of Google

1:12:16

focused web, which has been search

1:12:18

engine optimized into a wasteland. And

1:12:21

then you have the Reddit web,

1:12:23

which is the place where human

1:12:25

beings are still having interesting conversations.

1:12:27

Obviously, that is a vast oversimplification.

1:12:30

But that's why so many people put Reddit

1:12:32

into their search queries, because they want to

1:12:34

say to the search engine, let's guide your

1:12:36

attention to where the people are talking. So

1:12:38

for all of those reasons, it actually does

1:12:40

matter what happens to Reddit. Totally. And I

1:12:43

think it's also that Reddit in some ways

1:12:45

is a content moderation success

1:12:47

story. You know, Reddit used to be like

1:12:49

a lot of these websites, when it started

1:12:51

off, it was touted as a free speech

1:12:54

bastion, right? It was the CEO, you know,

1:12:56

a decade ago was saying things like, we

1:12:58

won't censor speech unless it's illegal, like some

1:13:00

of the same things that you hear people

1:13:03

like Elon Musk saying today. And

1:13:05

that it was known as kind of the

1:13:08

bowels of the internet, right? It was like,

1:13:10

often mentioned in the same breath as like

1:13:12

4chan or something awful, these like notorious cesspools,

1:13:14

where trolls would just like post gross

1:13:16

stuff and harass each other and be racist and

1:13:19

sexist and all that stuff. The Verge where I

1:13:21

worked at the time wrote a story then called

1:13:23

Reddit is a failed state. And it was for

1:13:25

exactly that reason. Totally. So it was sort of

1:13:27

seen as the, you know, a place where the

1:13:30

worst of the worst hung out. And

1:13:33

that was by design, the

1:13:35

company at the time was run by, you

1:13:37

know, leaders who thought that this should be

1:13:39

a free speech bastion, that it

1:13:41

should not censor content unless it was

1:13:43

illegal or spammy that basically anything should

1:13:46

go. And I think

1:13:48

to their credit, Reddit realized starting

1:13:50

in around 2014 and 2015

1:13:53

that they had to actually clean up their site

1:13:55

if they wanted to make it a sustainable business

1:13:57

and a place where people actually wanted to hang

1:13:59

out. You can go back and trace

1:14:01

the evolution, but starting in around 2014, there was a

1:14:03

CEO named Ellen Pow. She

1:14:05

started making some changes banning nonconsensual nude

1:14:08

images, things like that. Steve Huffman, who

1:14:10

was one of the co-founders of Reddit

1:14:12

who took back the site as CEO

1:14:14

in 2015, made a

1:14:17

bunch more changes. They nuked a

1:14:19

bunch of racist and misogynist and

1:14:21

violent subreddits. And

1:14:23

they really made a few changes that

1:14:25

I think really helped them clean their

1:14:27

act up and get ready for the

1:14:30

IPO that we saw this week. They

1:14:32

also had a really smart idea in

1:14:34

content moderation. When people make

1:14:36

rules about what you can and can't say

1:14:38

online, it just drives people absolutely crazy because

1:14:40

it turns out that almost every individual person

1:14:43

would draw the line slightly differently. Reddit had

1:14:45

a really smart idea though, which is we're

1:14:47

going to set this floor of rules that

1:14:49

everyone has to agree to. So you can't

1:14:51

post, you know, terrorist content, other horrible things.

1:14:53

But it's a pretty limited set of rules.

1:14:56

But every individual subreddit, every individual forum, they

1:14:58

can raise the ceiling of those rules. So

1:15:00

one of my favorite examples is there

1:15:03

is a community for women in India

1:15:05

on Reddit where the men are only

1:15:07

allowed to comment on Wednesdays. That's

1:15:10

true. Every other day, the men have to

1:15:12

shut up because it's a community for women.

1:15:14

And that's such a genius idea because you

1:15:17

can't do that on Instagram. You can't do

1:15:19

that on Facebook. Everybody's sort of crowded into

1:15:21

the same room and we make each other

1:15:23

miserable. But on Reddit, because they have this unique

1:15:25

system, they've been essentially able to decentralize power

1:15:28

into these little communities where people tend to

1:15:30

be a lot happier. Yeah. And we know

1:15:32

that like enlisting volunteer moderators and

1:15:34

giving them power and authority has not always

1:15:37

gone well for Reddit. There was that moderator

1:15:39

revolt last year. So they have created headaches

1:15:41

for themselves by doing this. But I think

1:15:43

you're right. It has been a transformative approach

1:15:46

to content moderation, not trying to make

1:15:48

one set of rules for everyone, but

1:15:50

like, you know, deputizing a bunch of

1:15:52

moderators who are passionate and enthusiastic and

1:15:55

crucially willing to work for free to

1:15:57

do this work for you. Yeah. That's

1:16:00

the story of why we think Reddit is cool

1:16:02

and why it matters. We should also

1:16:04

talk about Reddit as a business now that it's

1:16:06

actually selling shares on the open market. Yeah,

1:16:08

let's talk about it. What do you think about Reddit as a business? So

1:16:11

often, Kevin, when a social

1:16:13

network has gone public in the past,

1:16:15

it has felt like this coming of

1:16:17

age moment, right? When you think about

1:16:19

companies like Facebook or Twitter or Snap,

1:16:21

before they went public, they just faced

1:16:23

so much skepticism about whether they could

1:16:25

really succeed on the public markets. And

1:16:27

so when they actually made it over

1:16:29

the finish line, it was this moment

1:16:31

of validation of like, hey, like Facebook

1:16:33

is for real now, right? And

1:16:36

you know, some of those companies did better on the public

1:16:38

markets than others. Reddit doesn't feel that

1:16:40

way to me. It is essentially staggering

1:16:42

over this finish line, like it's been shot

1:16:44

in the gut. And it has been sort

1:16:47

of scrapping for every final yard and it

1:16:49

has finally got there. And so this is

1:16:51

like sort of a lifetime achievement award for

1:16:53

a company that really does feel foundational to

1:16:55

the modern internet, but has never really figured

1:16:57

out how to build much of a business

1:17:00

around it. Yeah, it's notable in part because

1:17:02

it's Reddit is not a young company. Most

1:17:04

startups try to go public, you know, sometime

1:17:06

in their first decade, sometimes they hold out

1:17:08

for a little bit longer. But Reddit is

1:17:10

19 years old. It was started

1:17:12

in 2005. And it's sort of

1:17:15

been there through a lot of different

1:17:17

shifts in internet life and

1:17:19

how we consume information online. And

1:17:22

I think in a lot of ways, it's trajectory

1:17:24

kind of mirrors that of the internet as a

1:17:26

whole. But you're right, it has never

1:17:29

been good at making money. So talk about why that

1:17:31

is. So Reddit's business,

1:17:33

for the most part, has been selling

1:17:35

ads. If you've been on Reddit, you've

1:17:37

seen this. And you know, like a

1:17:39

lot of these social networks, the game

1:17:42

is will create native ads that look

1:17:44

like Reddit posts. So you're browsing this

1:17:46

community. And you know, I might be

1:17:48

browsing my favorite pro wrestling community, r

1:17:50

slash squared circle. And then and

1:17:52

this really happened to me this week, I saw an

1:17:54

ad for Weight Watchers. Weight Watchers have

1:17:56

put there. And so I gave

1:17:59

it a downvote. because I wasn't trying to

1:18:01

see that, you know, while I was in

1:18:03

my wrestling community, but, you know, and maybe

1:18:05

that data informed something. But, you know, the

1:18:07

idea is, hey, if you have a really

1:18:09

good Reddit post and you happen to be

1:18:11

a brand, you might be able to get

1:18:13

a lot more reach than you would with

1:18:15

a traditional ad because people can hit that

1:18:17

upvote button and it may sort of spread.

1:18:19

So it has basically been an ad business,

1:18:21

but not all that great of an ad

1:18:23

business. You know, several years ago, Wired reported

1:18:25

that it projected it would make over a

1:18:27

billion dollars in ad revenue by 2023, but

1:18:30

it fell short last year by 20%. So

1:18:33

they haven't been able to get all the way

1:18:36

there. And so as they look for new sources

1:18:38

of revenue, they've started to think about things like,

1:18:40

hey, could we actually just sell all of this

1:18:42

data to Google and other companies? Yeah, and I

1:18:44

wanna talk about that data licensing business, but I

1:18:46

wanna ask first about the ad business. Like, why

1:18:49

is Reddit struggling so much to make money from

1:18:51

ads? Like when I look at Reddit, I see

1:18:53

a very popular website that is trusted by millions

1:18:55

of people. It is the only place on the

1:18:57

internet where you can find actual human beings talking

1:19:00

about actual things. That should be an

1:19:02

incredibly valuable space for advertisers to place

1:19:04

their ads. And yet if you look

1:19:07

at Reddit's ad business and compare it

1:19:09

to Meta's ad business or Google's ad

1:19:11

business, or even something like TikTok or

1:19:13

Snapchat or Amazon, it is just tiny

1:19:16

compared to those companies. So what do

1:19:18

you think explains Reddit's struggle when it

1:19:20

comes to attracting advertisers? Look, if you're

1:19:23

an advertiser and you want to reach

1:19:25

people on the internet, you have three

1:19:27

incredible businesses that already know so much

1:19:30

about a vast swath of society. And

1:19:32

those businesses are Meta, Google, and Amazon.

1:19:34

And let's face it, you can basically

1:19:36

reach any American by advertising on one

1:19:39

or all three of those platforms, right?

1:19:41

And you'll probably be able to do

1:19:43

it with more certainty that you reach

1:19:45

the audience that you're looking for. You're

1:19:47

probably gonna get back better data as

1:19:49

to whether your ad actually converted into

1:19:52

a sale. And the tools themselves

1:19:54

are just really sophisticated. So

1:19:56

for all of those reasons, the vast majority of the profits

1:19:58

in the digital ad industry are constantly... concentrated among

1:20:00

those three companies. And so

1:20:03

companies like Reddit have struggled. And we

1:20:05

should say, it's not just Reddit that

1:20:07

has struggled in this world. Snap another

1:20:09

one of these social networks went public

1:20:11

several years ago and has struggled a

1:20:13

lot. And its revenue is five times

1:20:15

as much as what Reddit is. And

1:20:17

they have had a horrible time on

1:20:19

the public market because they're just what

1:20:21

is considered a sub-scale advertising company. You

1:20:23

don't have enough people, enough data to

1:20:25

really make it a great business. Do

1:20:27

you think there's any hope that Reddit's

1:20:29

business will improve when it comes to ads? Or

1:20:31

do you think they basically sort of hit their ceiling?

1:20:34

I mean, I won't say that I think

1:20:36

that they've hit their ceiling. But when I

1:20:38

look at this company, I just keep thinking

1:20:40

about all of the challenges that Snap has

1:20:43

had. Snap, in a lot of ways, is

1:20:45

a much more ambitious company than Reddit. They've

1:20:47

tried a lot more things. They've played around

1:20:49

with hardware. I think they've brought a lot

1:20:51

more innovation to their core app than Reddit

1:20:53

has. Reddit looks very similar

1:20:55

today to what it did five or

1:20:57

10 years ago. So I see this

1:20:59

company that has been much more innovative,

1:21:01

that has tried much harder, that has invested

1:21:04

way more in research and development, and they're

1:21:06

flailing on the public markets. And then along

1:21:08

comes Reddit with its decent-ish

1:21:10

advertising tools. And I just think, oh, man,

1:21:13

they're going to have a hard time. But

1:21:15

what do you think? Yeah, I think Reddit

1:21:17

is sort of a victim of its own

1:21:19

popularity in a certain sense. Like, they suffer

1:21:21

from a massive free-booting problem, which is that

1:21:23

every time something goes viral on Reddit, it

1:21:26

then gets spread to all these other networks. And so

1:21:28

if you want to see the

1:21:31

best, oddly satisfying videos of the day, there's

1:21:33

probably an Instagram account that just takes those

1:21:35

from Reddit and posts them on its own

1:21:37

account. And so if you are an advertiser,

1:21:39

you can just reach the same kind of

1:21:41

audience on Instagram. The

1:21:43

other difference is that Reddit does

1:21:46

what's called contextual advertising. So you're

1:21:48

not being advertised to on Reddit

1:21:50

based on your browser history and

1:21:52

what websites you visited and your

1:21:55

location data from your phone. You're being

1:21:57

advertised to because you are on a

1:21:59

pro. Pro Wrestling Subreddit and

1:22:02

whatever advertisers are on that subreddit have chosen

1:22:04

to affiliate themselves with people who like Pro

1:22:06

Wrestling and want to read about it on

1:22:08

Reddit. Mountain Dew, Pizza, these are

1:22:10

some of the brands that come to mind for me. Yeah,

1:22:13

if you're a degenerate and you want to advertise

1:22:16

to other degenerates, you know where to find them.

1:22:18

Exactly. But I think that what

1:22:20

we've seen in the story of digital advertising

1:22:22

over the last decade or so is that

1:22:24

contextual ads just don't work as well as

1:22:26

sort of narrowly targeted ads at individuals based

1:22:28

on things like their own browsing history and

1:22:31

the usage of their products. So I just

1:22:33

think Reddit is playing in a category that

1:22:35

has struggled as a whole. But

1:22:37

I have hope. I think that as

1:22:39

Google gets flooded with sort of AI

1:22:42

generated stuff and other social networks start

1:22:44

to decay as well, who knows, maybe TikTok gets

1:22:46

banned. I do think that a lot of advertisers

1:22:50

may start seeing Reddit as a place where they

1:22:52

can actually reliably reach real humans. Well, it is

1:22:54

a bold claim and I guess we'll be able

1:22:56

to check back on that over the next few

1:22:58

months. But in the meantime, Kevin, as

1:23:00

we've noted, they have this other idea,

1:23:03

which is a data play. Yeah.

1:23:06

So Reddit is one of the places

1:23:08

where AI training companies, companies that make

1:23:10

and build and train AI models go

1:23:12

to get a high quality information to

1:23:14

feed into their models. We

1:23:17

know that Reddit has been

1:23:19

used to train things like chat GPT

1:23:21

and other sort of AI

1:23:23

language models. Without consent. Without

1:23:25

consent. And we also know that in response

1:23:28

to that, Reddit has tried to clamp down

1:23:30

on giving developers and AI builders access

1:23:32

to its own data. That's part of

1:23:35

the reason that it started charging these

1:23:37

higher fees last year to developers who

1:23:39

wanted to use the Reddit API. So

1:23:42

they are not sort of standing back and just letting

1:23:44

this happen. And in fact, they are

1:23:47

actually trying to get in on it themselves. And

1:23:50

I recently struck a deal with Google

1:23:52

to use Reddit content for training its

1:23:54

AI models. That deal was

1:23:56

reportedly worth $60 million, not

1:23:58

like a huge amount. That's not going

1:24:00

to make or break the company, but it is the

1:24:02

kind of thing that reddit presumably intends to do more

1:24:04

of What do you make of this strategy? The main

1:24:06

thing I make of that Kevin is is what you

1:24:08

just said which is it's not that much money this

1:24:10

company lost 91 million dollars

1:24:12

this year It signs a deal with Google

1:24:15

to provide all of this data so that

1:24:17

Google can do essentially whatever it wants with

1:24:19

it It's probably mostly gonna train its AI

1:24:21

models, and it's worth 60 million

1:24:24

dollars So even if you assume that

1:24:26

reddit is able to sign a similar

1:24:28

deal with an open AI Maybe an

1:24:30

anthropic and maybe that gets up to like

1:24:32

a hundred hundred eighty million dollars a year

1:24:34

It's still a pretty small business and like

1:24:36

this is one of the best shots that

1:24:39

they have left in their reserve, right? We

1:24:41

know about how big their ad business is

1:24:43

this data business It's looking much

1:24:45

more like a compliment to the ad business

1:24:47

than something that's gonna create this bright new

1:24:49

feature for this website Yeah,

1:24:52

I think you're right It's not going to change

1:24:54

their fortunes overnight But I do think it is

1:24:56

a signal that what reddit actually has which is

1:24:58

a place where people you know type reddit.com

1:25:00

into their browsers because they want to go

1:25:03

there and discuss things that they're passionate about

1:25:06

I do think that the value of

1:25:08

that will grow over time as more

1:25:10

and more of the internet gets sort

1:25:12

of eaten by AI generated sludge and

1:25:14

so I think that reddit is Smart to

1:25:16

bet on its future as among other

1:25:18

things a place where anyone

1:25:21

not just AI developers But where where

1:25:23

users where other businesses who want to

1:25:25

see or learn from people talking about

1:25:27

real things will go I don't

1:25:29

know I don't know that I

1:25:31

would do anything differently if I was

1:25:33

reddit But I do think that it's

1:25:36

a little sad that a website that

1:25:38

is almost 20 years old that has

1:25:40

you know untold reserves of high quality

1:25:42

discussions and frankly some low quality discussions

1:25:44

too That it's only worth 60

1:25:46

million dollars to Google Yeah, and and you

1:25:48

know I should also say that this company

1:25:50

is just not growing its user base really.

1:25:53

It's pretty flat Wire reported

1:25:55

it was sort of looking at what it

1:25:57

has been telling investors over the past few

1:25:59

years And they've been basically

1:26:01

stuck at around 500 million

1:26:03

monthly visitors, something like 73

1:26:05

million, 76 million visitors a

1:26:07

day. A

1:26:10

lot of the people who visit Reddit are not

1:26:13

logged in. That makes it harder to sell them

1:26:15

ads. So they do just like kind of have

1:26:17

a growth problem. Again, that's why I say that

1:26:19

they kind of staggered over the finish line. Like

1:26:21

it just doesn't feel like this is a company

1:26:24

that has the wind at its back when it

1:26:26

comes to user growth, revenue growth, new business ideas,

1:26:28

right? That's like pretty challenging set of circumstances to

1:26:30

carry into the public markets. All right.

1:26:33

So one of the notable things about

1:26:35

this IPO is that in addition to

1:26:37

offering its stock to the public, Reddit

1:26:39

also offered it to its own

1:26:42

users. The company allowed longtime

1:26:44

Redditors and moderators of some of

1:26:46

its most popular subreddits to buy

1:26:49

shares of the company's stock at

1:26:51

the IPO price. And

1:26:53

this was, I think, an attempt to kind of frame

1:26:56

this IPO as a good thing for

1:26:58

Reddit's community as a whole, not just

1:27:00

for the investors and executives who got to

1:27:02

cash out their shares to sort of

1:27:04

maybe capture some of the meme stock

1:27:07

potential of a Reddit IPO

1:27:09

and maybe get users excited

1:27:11

about the fact that they would be

1:27:13

able to actually make money from this thing that they had

1:27:15

been doing for free for so many years. Do you think

1:27:17

this was a good idea? I think

1:27:19

it is a nice idea, especially to

1:27:21

go out to these unpaid moderators who

1:27:23

in many ways are the backbone of

1:27:25

Reddit and say, we want to do

1:27:27

something nice for you. We're going to

1:27:29

give it this stock to you at

1:27:31

the IPO price. The reason that matters

1:27:33

is that typically these IPOs are priced

1:27:35

so that they pop on the first

1:27:38

day, the price goes up. It's a

1:27:40

long way of saying that IPO prices

1:27:42

are generally underpriced, right? So if that

1:27:44

is the case, then you would hope

1:27:46

that some of these Redditors would make

1:27:48

a little bit of money off of

1:27:50

the IPO. And that's great. My thing,

1:27:52

though, would just be like, why is

1:27:54

this a one time thing? Like, why

1:27:56

don't you just let moderators earn RSUs

1:27:58

in the company through the... the course

1:28:00

of doing business, I think Reddit should take this idea

1:28:02

and build on it, I guess would be my message.

1:28:04

Yeah. I mean, Reddit has never, you know,

1:28:07

for sort of strange and

1:28:10

quirky reasons, it has never had trouble

1:28:12

convincing people to work for free moderating

1:28:15

subreddits that they're passionate about. So I don't know that

1:28:17

it feels like it has to start routinely

1:28:19

issuing stock to people who run, you

1:28:21

know, pro wrestling subreddit or history subreddit

1:28:24

or gardening subreddit. That said, I

1:28:26

think this was a good gesture on the company's part.

1:28:29

And I think it creates the potential to

1:28:31

sort of ease some of these

1:28:33

conflicts that have historically plagued Reddit

1:28:35

between moderators of popular subreddits and

1:28:37

executives who run the company, who

1:28:39

have clashed many times over the

1:28:41

years, not just about this data

1:28:43

licensing thing last year. They've clashed

1:28:45

repeatedly and routinely. You could almost

1:28:47

set your watch by it over

1:28:49

the years. And so I

1:28:51

wonder if this actually creates a

1:28:54

kind of aligned incentive structure, because

1:28:57

now moderators, some of them, the ones who

1:28:59

chose to buy stock in Reddit at the

1:29:01

IPO price, actually have kind of

1:29:03

the same incentives as the people who work at

1:29:05

the company in terms of making it a more

1:29:07

profitable business. And I wonder if

1:29:10

last year when this drama erupted

1:29:12

over these API changes, if moderators

1:29:14

might have been a little easier

1:29:16

to please, if they if you

1:29:18

could go to them as Reddit and say, look,

1:29:20

we're making these changes. We know this is annoying.

1:29:22

We know it's not, you know, something that you

1:29:24

like. But look, it's going to open up this

1:29:26

data licensing business to AI companies. It's going to

1:29:29

make us all more money. I wonder

1:29:31

if that would have quelled the rebellion. I

1:29:33

don't I don't think it would have. I

1:29:35

like I basically completely disagree with this, because

1:29:37

I think that the average Reddit user has

1:29:39

never been there to make money. They're there

1:29:41

to have a good time. They're there to

1:29:43

be entertained. They're there to learn. They want

1:29:45

a website that works well. That is not

1:29:47

actually the incentive that Steve Huffman has as

1:29:49

the CEO. His incentive is to make the

1:29:51

company profitable. You know, during last year's controversy,

1:29:53

somebody asked them like, essentially, when are you

1:29:55

going to stop with all of these changes

1:29:57

that you're making? And he said, when we.

1:30:00

become profitable. The

1:30:02

median user of Reddit, I would wager, doesn't

1:30:04

care if the site becomes profitable, and I

1:30:06

don't think giving them a few shares of

1:30:08

stock really changes that equation. I think you'd

1:30:10

have to essentially buy off the entire user

1:30:12

base to the point where they were collectively

1:30:14

one of the largest shareholders in the company.

1:30:16

What I suspect is going to happen instead

1:30:18

is that a relatively few number of Reddit

1:30:20

users are going to own the stock, and

1:30:22

some private equity firm or some other group

1:30:24

of activist shareholders are going to come in

1:30:26

in two years and they're going to say,

1:30:28

this business sucks, we're taking it private, we're

1:30:30

going to introduce a bunch of horrible new

1:30:32

monetization schemes, and we will have another Reddit

1:30:35

revolt. That would be so depressing,

1:30:37

and I totally think it's the most likely

1:30:39

outcome here is that activist

1:30:41

investors say, we

1:30:43

can make a lot more money

1:30:45

if we just jam everyone's feed

1:30:47

full of AI garbage, and

1:30:49

that seems like a much more profitable

1:30:51

business. Or we're going to turn this

1:30:53

into TikTok, start emphasizing short-form video, and

1:30:55

I can totally see that happening, and

1:30:58

it really bums me out. I hope

1:31:00

for its own sake and for the sake of

1:31:02

the internet at large that Reddit continues to be

1:31:04

Reddit in some recognizable form. Me too. Long

1:31:07

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1:31:28

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1:32:35

to Paula Schumann we winged ham

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Kaitlyn Presti and Jeffrey Miranda You

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can email us at hard fork at n y

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time You

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You Start

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clean with Clorox because Clorox delivers

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a powerful clean every time because

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messes happen because Another

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charcoal mask great because why would I put that

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on my face when I could drop it in

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my sink? This is what I get for multitasking.

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Oh, why is charcoal so sticky? Hello. Hey Janice.

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I am so sorry I thought I was on

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you. No, we don't need to reschedule. I'll just

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stay off camera. Oh Yeah,

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that happens. So start clean with

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Clorox Use

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Clorox products as directed products as directed you