00:00:00
so as you recall just last week people on reddit
nearly bankrupted a very famous hedge fund they
00:00:08
did that by using a strategy that hedge funds have
used for years they shorted stock in companies
00:00:13
like gamestock and drove them up for that purpose
now of course only hedge funds were allowed to
00:00:19
manipulate the stock market so corporations turned
to a familiar tool they censored the people on
00:00:24
reddit the online service discord for example
accused the reddit day traders of hate speech
00:00:29
and then there were the questions around robin
hood which was the service they used to conduct
00:00:32
those trades all of this is filled with lessons
for the rest of us we're not financial experts
00:00:38
we're talking to someone now who is david sacks is
a technology entrepreneur very well known in that
00:00:42
world he co-founded paypal he wrote a really smart
piece about the implications of the story you can
00:00:47
find on the online publishing platform persuasion
and we wanted to talk to him tonight david thanks
00:00:51
so much for coming on so you have the grounding
in this world sufficient i think to draw informed
00:00:58
conclusions about what happened and what it
means for everybody else what have you concluded
00:01:04
sure well tucker you know you've been warning
about censorship and the slippery slope when
00:01:09
people start to invoke censorship and i
think we see it here with with discord
00:01:14
uh you have a case here where some wall street
traders their their message board was taken down
00:01:18
they weren't engaging in political speech at all
they were engaging in a plan to give these wall
00:01:23
street predators a taste of their own medicine
because of that they were very threatening to
00:01:27
the people in power and they were accused of hate
speech and they were taken down now if you were to
00:01:31
actually go into these message boards you wouldn't
see hate speech you would see a lot of very
00:01:35
raunchy speech but nothing that's too different
than what you'd see on any trading floor or
00:01:40
or boiler room on wall street you know and all of
a sudden these uh sort of titans of wall street
00:01:44
are just shock shocked by the language that's
going on here so you know look this is when you
00:01:49
this is a really good example i think of when you
strip away sort of partisan issues you see that
00:01:54
the real purpose of censorship is as a as a tool
for the people in power to keep the outsiders out
00:02:03
i think that's really smart so when they invoke
the phrase hate speech especially of all of all
00:02:09
the phrases they use i think is the scariest
nobody wants to be thought of as a hater or
00:02:14
you know using hate speech that's an awful thing
that's certainly how i feel but what you're saying
00:02:19
is they don't employ that in order to protect the
weak they use that phrase in order to protect the
00:02:24
strong yeah exactly i mean hate speech is a very
malleable term and so the people who get to decide
00:02:31
what it means which is really always the issue
with censorship is who decides who has that power
00:02:36
right it's the people in power get to decide what
it means and so you know you had a case here where
00:02:41
look these message boards weren't set up for the
purpose of organizing hate or even any political
00:02:46
topic they were organized to talk about a trade
and they you know figured out actually a plan that
00:02:52
worked perfectly to execute a short squeeze and
these hedge funds lost 20 billion dollars and so
00:02:57
they were you know in a lot of trouble a lot
of financial distress and they were looking
00:03:01
for a way out and so the way they they found a
way out was to go through these message boards
00:03:06
they screenshot any posts that could plausibly
be characterized as hate speech they report it
00:03:11
and then they get the site taken down and
so this is kind of where the slippery slope
00:03:15
of censorship goes is that whenever outsiders
become too threatening to powerful insiders the
00:03:21
insiders use censorship as a weapon they weaponize
these these speech rules to prevent the threat
00:03:28
so you're making a very traditional liberal
argument i mean you're saying what the aclu
00:03:33
said for about a hundred years what you know nat
hendoff used to write about in the village voice
00:03:38
why aren't more people saying that now do you
think more people empowered with authority
00:03:45
well it's a really good question tucker and i
think part of it is that a lot of the people in
00:03:50
power are frankly threatened by these new social
networks and so certainly the traditional media
00:03:56
has been very upset with social networks and
social media because of it's a threat to their
00:04:01
influence and business model you certainly
saw these you know wall street titans uh
00:04:06
become very nervous that all of a sudden their
control over the monopoly board was threatened
00:04:11
by these these outsiders these these reddit
kids and so frankly the people in power don't
00:04:16
have any reason to want to like social
networks because social networks allow
00:04:22
large groups of outsiders to get together and
so they accuse social networking ironically of
00:04:28
being a threat to democracy but this isn't a
threat when you're talking about large numbers
00:04:33
of people getting together to organize for change
that is democracy that's not a threat to democracy
00:04:38
what it is is a potential threat to the people
in power and that's why they don't like it man
00:04:44
i mean you're one of the people who built sort
of the internet that we use and you're saying
00:04:48
what people said 20 years ago when they built it
you're about the only one still saying it though
00:04:52
which is this is supposed to democratize things
and empower normal people no one else seems to
00:04:57
believe that except you anymore but i appreciate
that you do david sacks thank you thank you
