00:00:00
I never used to think about it before, but now I think literally anything I write down somewhere the government might have.
00:00:05
You also shove everything into JBT. Serious. I don't do it at all, but Oh, I love Yeah, I'm in I'm definitely
00:00:11
in a very promiscuous with the information. I' got to be promiscuous somewhere. Hi everyone, this is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Cara Swisser
00:00:28
and I'm Scott Galloway. How you doing today, Scott? I'm good. I got a little bit of the the
00:00:34
uh the Xbar hangover. Did at Xandy last night 4 a.m. Couldn't sleep. What are you having trouble sleeping when you're old? I'm getting I am. I I wake up at 48 every night.
00:00:44
I'm turning into one of those people that just like a ghost walking around the house. I used to be such a good sleeper. Yeah, you're supposed to do that. You're
00:00:50
supposed to get up and walk around, just so you know. Not not try to go to sleep lying there. Yeah. Uh what did I watch? I've been
00:00:58
watching, you know what? I'll watch anything with my favorite actor, Hitler. I just type
00:01:04
in World War II and I watch the Battle of the Bulgian color. Um, I'm obsessed with World War II. I'm officially 100 years old. Not Rome. I usually men are Rome, but
00:01:15
Rome or Hitler usually seems to be things men of your age like to watch. No. No, I don't.
00:01:21
Not Rome. Why don't you ask me what I did this weekend? Oh, I'm sorry. What did you do this weekend? I had a mermaid party.
00:01:28
Oh yeah. So that obviously was for Lucky, not for one of your kids. No, it was for Clara. It was like So it
00:01:35
was so interesting cuz all the girls showed up in mermaid outfits. Every single one of them. And they were fantastic, let me just say, versions of
00:01:42
mermaids. All kinds of spangles and this and that. All the guys, all the boys, many showed up in superhero costumes. Interesting. Yeah. If if anyone wants to believe
00:01:53
gender is not a thing, just have a party and invite boys and girls over and see what they do. Put a room full of dolls
00:01:58
and cars and see what happens. Yeah, it was interesting. It was They looked fantastic. Claire had a great
00:02:04
time. We had a treasure hunt. Amanda baked the cake. It was beautiful and delicious. Um and it was fun. It was
00:02:11
good. I cleaned the yard with my power washer. That was fun for me. That part. We really have gender. Speaking of
00:02:16
gender roles, that's a flex. I know. She baked a cake and you did the power wash. So if it's a really difficult parking spot, you handle it. Is that what you're saying? Yes, that's correct.
00:02:27
That's what's going on. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And in fact, I get handed like this morning Saul handed me
00:02:33
one. Every time he has something broken or needs a battery, he hands it to me. Mom will fix it. Yeah. I We are in a
00:02:40
gender role. I hate to say it, but it's true. The best alliance in history is the alliance between masculine and feminine
00:02:46
energy, I guess. I don't know. I'm good at fixing things. I really am. That's true. That's great. Yeah. Yeah. Anyway, um it was a fun
00:02:52
weekend. It was really nice. It was It was lovely. So, is it is there a specific mermaid
00:02:58
piece of IP? What is it? Oh, yeah. Little Mermaid. Yeah. Well, they loved Listen, everyone likes
00:03:03
K-pop Demon Hunters still. This is like a crazy trend happening. Um but, uh among boys and girls, by the way. Um but
00:03:11
uh Mermaid, Little Mermaid, that's the the Disney mermaid. My my favorite kind of mermaid IP is Bill Bellich's Instagram of his 22-year-old mermaid. I
00:03:23
love the thought I love that they planned that they thought this will be a big hit. This is a really good idea.
00:03:30
Have you Have you seen that Instagram of them? Yes. Yes. Oh my god. I know. I know. I'm so here for it.
00:03:36
Are you Is that going to be you someday? Do not You best wife. Let's hope so. I I need to get much
00:03:41
richer. Why do you think I'm doing this? value that lady of yours. She is a same. I should do the same. But let me just
00:03:47
say your lady is fantastic. My lady. Your lady. My as Robert Redford. As Robert Redford
00:03:54
said when he was accepting lifetime and my lady friend. My lady must make her feel good. I like that. I like that. My lady friend. Yeah. I often call men ladies. Like I go, "Hey ladies, let's go." And it it
00:04:06
annicy of which, what are you dressing up for Halloween? Oh, I'm got I'm so excited.
00:04:16
I'm so excited. I am. Again, my assistant, who is usually in charge, wanted me to go as Larry David. And I'm
00:04:23
like, that's just No one's going to invite me into the bathroom to do ketamine when I'm dressed like Larry David. Okay, you're right. You're right.
00:04:28
No, like hot women are going to come up to me and say, oh, you know, hey, what can I get your can I follow you on? That would work. Larry David would work,
00:04:34
but go ahead. Oh, 100%. I'm bringing out I'm bringing out the the one that works. I'm going as
00:04:40
Deadpool again. Oh, but I'm going as Deadpool. I'm going as Deadpool after the fire, so
00:04:45
I have to get a makeup artist to put all these scars all over my head. Oh, wow. Okay. But I don't know which private members
00:04:51
club to go to. There's a lot of competition this year cuz they're all they're all compet it's it's crazy. If
00:04:58
you think the competition between AI is intense, it's nothing compared to the private
00:05:03
membership bloodbath that is taking place in make it right. Oh, no. There's what happened was I'm
00:05:12
fascinated with the economics of this. Okay. Um, basically there's been public. Can you Which one's Soho House?
00:05:18
Soho House is public. It just got taken private. Right. It's a It's a fantastic deal. It's a great idea. It doesn't make money. It
00:05:24
spends too much money. Shouldn't have been a public company. It's been taken private. But that's sort of like a Toyota, like
00:05:29
good value for the money. Young. And then this really talented entrepreneur, this guy named Scott Sartiano, who's a lovely guy, started
00:05:36
Zero Bond. He came in with a Mercedes offering and everything's demographically driven. There's there's just so much money now at the top 1%.
00:05:45
And it was a huge hit. And I'm not exaggerating. And about 36 months or 24 months later, these things just started
00:05:51
popping up everywhere. Literally everywhere. And the bummer is I mean, if you have money, great. The bummer is is that where do where do young people go
00:06:04
who don't have the money to get into? That's an opening. That's an opening in those kind in that area is cheaper and
00:06:10
but then again if it's too cheap then it's everyone can go. You know it's interesting. There's the same phenomena
00:06:15
here in DC. There's the Ned and then there's this one the Trump people opened up with Chimath Polyhapatia and the
00:06:21
whole gang. But that one a Trumper just told me they're all dropping in price especially the Trump one. Like it was
00:06:27
started at like $500,000 now it's down. No, no one wants to go hang out with those guys. And also you're
00:06:33
but I'm just saying it dropped. you're ignoring a basic truth and that is or we're not talking about basic truth. The reality is all these things are driven
00:06:39
off of two things. They're driven off of rich men and the hot women that like rich men. There's some there's some fun
00:06:46
cool stuff that's creative on the Lower East Side, but the reality is these private members clubs, they price
00:06:51
discriminate, which they should uh for younger people, but basically it's a bunch of 40some year old dudes and a
00:06:57
bunch of hot 20some year old women. When I moved, I I remember going there's such
00:07:02
a weird p like power dynamic in terms of the mating market. When I first moved to New York, I just came out of UCLA where
00:07:10
I was not a big deal, but I was young and good-looking and finally coming in my own and dating a lot of very highc
00:07:16
caliber women. I got to New York at the age of 22, was a Morgan Stanley analyst.
00:07:21
I couldn't get arrested because any of the women who used to date me at UCLA were dating 35-year-old hedge fund
00:07:26
managers that could take him to the Hamptons. So, if you're a guy in your 20s in New York, you might as well be
00:07:33
invisible. At the same time, if you're a woman going into her 30s who's nice and attractive, but not crazy hot, you might
00:07:39
as well be invisible. New York is America. It's optimized for two people, wealthy men and hot women. And for
00:07:45
everybody else, it's a soul crushing experience. And these clubs are that on steroids. I would agree. I don't, you know, I
00:07:50
don't drink and I I but I've started going to bars with Amanda. Just the idea of going to bars now is more appealing
00:07:56
than a club to me like with other people. Are they lounges or bars? Well, this one was this little thing
00:08:01
called a fountain in and it was just it's just an old Georgetown house that they redid. Wait, did you have a pimp's cup with
00:08:07
Chuck Todd? No. No, I didn't. There's no Chuck Todd. Jesus. The other one is more like a bar
00:08:13
and it was full of young people but older people because they had games, they had uh pingpong, they had um it
00:08:19
just was lovely food but not too fancy just it was full of young people playing games which I loved like and not just young people it was like a mix. It was really It was Can't imagine anything lame or I just
00:08:31
did I just ordered Negronis with George Stephanopoulos. I didn't It wasn't those people. It was
00:08:36
not fancy. I'm just saying that I'm not I'm not exaggerating. I avoid DC cuz there's like I've never found the only late night drinking spots Yeah. are like interns and you feel like a
00:08:48
perve. There's like no cool lounges or places. Well, I'll take you I don't belong to the Ned, but we'll go to the Ned. Ned is
00:08:53
actually kind of nice. It's Oh, it's a membership club. Yeah, it's a membership club. It's right across from the White House. It's on top of Rigs Bank. It's actually my neighbor
00:09:00
belongs. So, we'll have I'll have her drag us there. We'll go there. Okay. Yeah. Oh, yeah. That sounds great.
00:09:06
You're never coming here. Oh, no. The night we have our show. That's where we're going to go. Okay. All right. We have a show here in DC, by the way. Um,
00:09:12
anyway, we got to get to stuff. The tour is going great. It's selling great. So, buy your tickets. We're sold out.
00:09:17
Are we? Are we? We're sold out. No, we're sold out in uh the city. We're sold out in Toronto and San Francisco for sure.
00:09:24
We're sold out in Toronto. I heard. And San Francisco. I had lots of And San Francisco.
00:09:29
Yeah. Now, just don't tell anyone the venue is 12 people. We're doing it in Ly's old old basement apartment.
00:09:36
Anyway, we've got a lot to get to today. Um, including Open AI backtracking on copyrights. What a shock. And Elon Musk
00:09:43
pushing for a Netflix boycott. Oh, good god. But first, President Trump's immigration crackdown is escalating.
00:09:49
Actually, this is quite troubling. Over the weekend, he authorized the deployment of 300 Illinois National Guard troops to Chicago. Uh, Governor JB
00:09:56
Pritsker is warning that federal agents and raids are turning the city into a war zone. He's creating problems. Trump
00:10:02
also keeps trying to send National Guard troops into Portland. He first attempt to send Oregon national troops in. It was blocked by a federal judge whom he
00:10:10
appointed. He then tried to deploy troops from California, was blocked by the same judge who was really pissed
00:10:16
off. So, he keeps trying to find National Guard. This judge is going to block it completely. National uh uh
00:10:22
Texas National Guard troops are also in the mix for Oregon and Illinois with Governor Abbott's blessing. By the way,
00:10:27
he is saying some things that are incredibly inflammatory, saying maybe Portland should be gone. Um all this
00:10:33
none of your [ __ ] business, Greg Abbott, like sit down. I shouldn't say that, but all this uh as protests
00:10:39
intensify in Chicago and Portland over these ICE raids. Um, I don't know what you thought, um, what you've seen, but it seems like a really truly demented escalation. And Homeland Secretary
00:10:51
Christy Gnome is also saying ICE agents will be all over the Super Bowl where Bad Bunny is the halftime headliner. Um,
00:10:59
I don't I don't know who, as who can afford, as you noted, uh, going to the Super Bowl, but it's very expensive for
00:11:05
people to know. So, any thoughts on all this? Cuz it's truly troubling what's happening here. It's all led by Steven
00:11:11
Miller, obviously. Well, there's two things here. The first is I I just think this whole thing is such manufactured division. And that is if you think about socialism
00:11:23
is supposed to be is about equality, right? That we should have, everyone should have the economy, the spoil
00:11:30
should be, you know, William Gibson said the future's here. It's just not evenly distributed. You could say the same thing about capitalism if it's left
00:11:37
unchecked. The prosperity happens. It's just not evenly distributed. Socialism is a means of correcting that by the
00:11:44
government owning the means of production. By the way, this is hands down economically the most socialist government America has ever had.
00:11:50
Correct. Nearly liberalism is the idea that everyone should be free to pursue liberty even if
00:11:56
it means no search, you know, very strict private property and search and seizure laws where you may know that
00:12:02
that house there's crime in it, but if you don't have a warrant, a search warrant approved by a judge, you're not
00:12:07
allowed to go in. We believe in gun rights as a form of liberalism to a certain extent because we believe it's
00:12:13
worth a certain amount. I don't want to protect gun rights, but the whole idea of a liberal democracy is
00:12:19
the pursuit of liberty. Fascism, the juice of fascism is trying to convince people that the enemy is within
00:12:26
attacking attacking and threatening the chosen way of life. And that's what this is. This is fascism
00:12:35
on any metric. the idea that crime is out of control. If that were true, then it was way more out of control several years ago. And also, if you were really
00:12:46
serious about reducing crime, you wouldn't be sending in federal troops who don't know how to conduct crime investigations, don't know how to
00:12:52
collect evidence, don't know how to arrest people. They're just to there to intimidate people. I believe I I am a
00:13:00
believer that if you're going to spend now over a trillion dollars in the military, you should be proactive around
00:13:06
the use of the military. I would rather see these guys and gals in Ukraine supporting long-range missile missile launches to destroy oil
00:13:19
infrastructure. I would rather see them as a peacekeeping force in Gaza. They are ineffective and all they do is tear at the fabric of society and make us hate each other. And here's the
00:13:30
bottom line. We're not that divided. No. What we have is an administration and godlike technology dividing us. Yeah. Creating tension. I mean, it was interesting because there's still a few
00:13:44
troops around DC and I went by one last night and and I I was trying to be nice and I I was like, "You guys should go home." Like I was very nice about it and they're like don't you think we want to
00:13:55
go home? This is ridiculous. They were like they were like not wanting to be there either. It's so they
00:14:01
were standing on the corner and then do you see the picture from Portland? They were at Voodoo Donuts. There were all these these troops at
00:14:07
Voodoo Donuts which are like delicious donuts, may I add? I mean what do you think about the the everything's
00:14:13
performative whether it's Christy Gnome or Steven Miller who I think is a committed fascist actually. The others I think are very performative. uh looking
00:14:21
at you know Pete Hex has one to run. I bet Christy Gnome wants to be president. Um but it's really it creates if you
00:14:28
create enough problem with these people there you will have a clash which is I think what they
00:14:33
want. That's what they're looking for. That's what they're looking for a fight. Now one of the things that's been and this is in our wheelhouse big tech is
00:14:40
getting involved in all this. Apple and Google have pulled several apps that let users flag sightings of ICE agents
00:14:45
including a widely used app called Ice Block. Uh, the move comes after Attorney General Pam Bondi pressed Apple to
00:14:51
remove IceBlock, claiming it puts federal officers at risk for doing their jobs. The app's creator slammed the
00:14:56
decision, accusing Apple of bending to what he called an authoritarian regime. Meanwhile, ICE is hiring contractors to
00:15:01
scan Facebook, Tik Tok, and YouTube to find leads for enforcement raids and also monitor people's social feeds.
00:15:07
Again, communist. This is what the authoritarians do. What do you think of And we have given so much of our information over to these companies and they don't deserve the trust we have
00:15:17
given them in lots of ways. I I I I'm of mixed mind on the ice block and at the same time I'm kind of like well this is what happens when you do things like this like people get creative. There's
00:15:30
one in San Francisco is showing where parking meter people are which the the city got mad about so you could move
00:15:35
your car in time. I mean it it seems like when you do one thing and people take a action against the other, guess
00:15:42
what's going to happen? What do you think about the tech companies? I'm on the tech company's side of this. If you get a letter from the attorney general telling you to take an app down, I I just think you have to comply with
00:15:52
the law. I don't I don't I don't fault them for doing that. What what I think this shows though is that we need more diversity of platforms. I also I do like the idea of encryption,
00:16:07
but at the same time, I like the government's ability. We're better at spying than anyone else in the world.
00:16:13
And America and the Israelis have basically developed technology where they can essentially hack almost any phone. I quite frankly like that because I do think of us at the end of the day as the good guys. At the same time, you said
00:16:25
something that's really stuck with me and that is people should have the right to have secrets. I really like that. I
00:16:33
like the idea. I never used to think about it before, but now I think literally anything I write down
00:16:38
somewhere the government might have or that you also shove everything into GPT. Serious. I don't do it at all, but
00:16:44
Oh, I love Yeah, I'm in I'm definitely in a very promiscuous with the information.
00:16:50
Got to be promiscuous somewhere. Anyway, so but I find that fascinating. I just I'm curious how it comes back with
00:16:56
stuff. But so I don't I don't think you can fault tech for taking down these platforms. I the the the images of
00:17:08
American cities and ICE agents and masks. Oh, they're terrible. I think it I think that will go down as
00:17:15
a pretty I mean not not on the same level as the interament of Japanese families, but
00:17:22
kind of the same flavor. Yeah, absolutely. Did you see that one where the guy was just standing there on the sidewalk? He was close to him and
00:17:28
the guy was like off and he like he wasn't close enough to have what they did to him. He was
00:17:35
near him, right? He was a tall guy near an AIDS agent and he he goes back off and he was like, "I'm standing on the sidewalk." And then the guy took him to the ground and beat the living [ __ ] [ __ ] out of him. It was crazy. It's
00:17:47
crazy. Well, there's there's tests. A lot of police forces have tests and I say, "Okay, we understand that people who
00:17:54
might like the idea of having a gun and a badge sometimes might have a background
00:18:00
might have a background where they want to be in a position of authority and we got to be clear that they're going into that position for the right reasons."
00:18:06
And it strikes me that if if you are signing up for ICE right now, and I realize people have an obligation to make a living, you're not doing this to protect and serve. you're doing that. I think
00:18:19
there's a decent chance that you have some underlying hostility towards immigrants that is not is not befitting and the
00:18:27
fact that you can wear a mask. Yeah. Judges make really dangerous decisions every day. They put very dangerous
00:18:34
people behind prisons. They don't wear masks. Yeah. So the fact that these we have decided to normalize the idea that
00:18:41
certain uh certain people in the of the government on on the street can wear a mask. What that means is we want to give them license and we want to give them the confidence to engage
00:18:54
in depraved uh vile behavior. If I if if we trust our society enough that someone can put a mobster, a murderous mobster in prison
00:19:06
and the jurists and the judge don't get to wear masks. Y then why on earth would we let people
00:19:13
who supposedly are legally deporting people here illegally wear masks? Why? because the way they are engaging in it
00:19:19
is a form of of of violence, of a violation of people's rights, of an activity that makes you feel really bad about America and humanity and does nothing. I was with someone who's a
00:19:33
fairly famous anchor and their partner has left the country, their partner is legal, but because
00:19:41
they're non-white, they can't relax. They're worried about they know that if they don't want to be incarcerated
00:19:47
incorrectly for 72 hours or whatever. Yeah, exactly. Let me say speaking of judges not wearing masks,
00:19:53
the the per people are now under attack are the judges. Steven Miller started to call judges insurrectionists now for
00:20:00
doing their job. And one of the judges who pushed back on one of Trump's many violations of the law had her house burned down. They don't know what happened, but the house was burned down.
00:20:11
Stephen Miller right now I if this man doesn't go to jail someday for what he's in what he is creating here creating all
00:20:19
kinds of anger or down in shame. If you notice one of another one of his relatives said he he's a heinous piece
00:20:24
of [ __ ] used to be normal and now is we don't know what's happened to him. The whole family but um but the judges are
00:20:32
the ones under siege. You're right. They don't get to wear a mask. They they stand they write long rulings and if
00:20:38
these thugs that's what they are. If they're wearing masks, you're a thug. If you want to do it, you don't need to have your identity protected. What are
00:20:45
you like a like a delicate flower? If judges don't, which who don't have guns, if uh if other pe juries don't, they don't have guns to protect them, you should not have a a mask on your face.
00:20:57
That to me is it says everything. Let me just say the the one thing that was really heartening to hear is the pope uh
00:21:04
who has been talking about this during a mass this past Sunday. Pope Leo urged Catholics to open their hearts and arms
00:21:10
to migrants. This came after he referenced the inhuman treatment of immigrants in the United States while speaking to reporters last week. Press
00:21:17
Secretary Carolyn Levit as usual because she's a mouthpiece pushed back on those comments. And Mag influence also voiced
00:21:22
their unhappiness with the Pope. Um, I thought what he said was really strong, was a very strong. He spoke out on
00:21:28
immigration. He spoke on a lot of things. This guy is just as sharp as attack. And I like that he's sort of entering the picture for decency. I
00:21:36
guess that's what I would say. He's I don't think it's left or right. It's like don't be indecent. I don't know if
00:21:41
you have any thoughts on that. Look, the the term undocumented worker is a misnomer because here's the thing. These people have documents. They have
00:21:52
phone contracts. They have driver's licenses. They have social security cards. They have W2s.
00:21:59
They have all sorts of documents to ensure that US corporations can can build them. They have uh bank accounts so they can wire money home so banks can get the float. They have all sorts of
00:22:11
documentation such that we can make money from them. And the notion that they're okay, I get it. If you're here illegally, you should be asked to leave.
00:22:22
I I I I understand that. Now, at the same time, and it all comes back to the same thing, if we were serious about this problem, we would find the employers. I mean,
00:22:35
if they're not here because they like the weather, they're here because there's jobs. Because a lot of domestic workers will
00:22:41
not take these jobs. They will not wipe your grandmother's ass or build your house for 15 bucks an hour. Nope. And if we want to have cheaper
00:22:49
houses, cheaper health care, better services, better restaurants, we have for the last 40 or 50 years turned a blind eye to this. We have done it intentionally on both sides of the administration. We didn't wake up with
00:23:01
tens of millions undocumented workers. Did Democrats and the Biden administration probably let it go too
00:23:06
far? Yes. But this notion of like turning into a police state and demonizing these people and taking our eye off the ball off of real security threats. Also, I am somewhat
00:23:19
empathetic to the notion that Democratic governors invited an an overcorrection by virtue signaling all the [ __ ] time instead of actually cleaning up their own cities that they're governing. True, but Scott, that's like taking a a
00:23:33
sledgehammer to a fly, right? I 100% agree. Right. It's a total overreaction. And
00:23:39
the thing that's most depressing is I shared a clip. I believe it was from the Pirates of the Caribbean movie with the
00:23:44
ship blowing up around the sky. And it had this caption, "This is how it feels to be a centrist in the US." And I
00:23:50
wrote, "No, it's worse." And the comments were like, "Uh, centrists are fascists, centrists are enablers. We are just so divided and angry right now."
00:24:03
Tom Thomas Freriedman had something I thought he had something very cogent or on
00:24:08
on Mar he said we're not that divided we're just being divided. Yeah. And everyone says come together and
00:24:15
everything and we need to turn the heat down. I'm telling you folks it's not about a politician trying to cosplay
00:24:21
Obama and turn down the political heat. These we have connected 40% of the S&P to rage and sequestering us from one another. Yep. And what hap I am I don't know
00:24:32
about you. I go on social media now and I see these videos of these kids and these women being
00:24:40
separated from their husbands on social media and I [ __ ] hate America for about 30 seconds. And I'm not saying it's not important that we don't see that, but when you have an administration and algorithms
00:24:53
that say, "Oh, we're going to this is going to make us so much money. We're going to have so many Nissan ads from this." Yeah.
00:24:58
So, we have this onetwo punch of an administration that conflates masculinity and leadership with
00:25:04
coarseness and cruelty and algorithms that make a [ __ ] ton of money from it. And the result is I if you were to go
00:25:12
out today, ice raids and all, and I'm not in any way accepting or or or diminishing the the ugliness of these ice raids, but if you go out in Portland, if you go out in Paripony, New
00:25:26
Jersey, or you go out in in Province Town, you're generally going to find Americans from all political spectrums are generally speaking really lovely
00:25:37
people. No, you're right. I would agree. I I would agree with you. I just think one of the issues is this is an attempt
00:25:42
to divide and create anger and it works. And I think what's really nice is to see everyone coming around to something you
00:25:49
and I have been going on about forever. Uh you saw Mcronone talk about social media. You talked you you see everyone
00:25:56
is now on this bandwagon. And we these people should not be trusted with our information or decision-m about our society. It's enough with them deciding what we should do. Look, we're willing
00:26:08
addicts to these people, but is heroin. And it will not end well if we don't take some control of this. And what the
00:26:15
Trump administration has done to take control is to get bribes from them. And that's what they are. These these
00:26:20
payouts and let them do whatever they want. They need to be drastically regulated in many many ways or taxed
00:26:28
either way. Uh you know, they need to be pulled back in ways that shouldn't be making decision-making. And that that
00:26:33
will get us to our next thing when we get back. Um, OpenAI uh does an about face on copyright policy for Sora 2.
00:26:41
Scott, we're back with more news. OpenAI has backtracked and will give copyright holders more control over how their
00:26:46
characters are used on Sora, its new AI video generation app. Uh, as a reminder,
00:26:52
leading up to the launch, the company has said copyright holders would have to opt out of having material appear in
00:26:58
videos. Scott that made excellent points last week. CEO Sam Alman said the company would have to quote somehow make
00:27:04
money from the app to offset costs. Oh well don't make it if you can't make money Sam and would try to share some of
00:27:10
the revenue with rights holders who opt in. We'll try to share. Thanks. Sora is a top a free app in Apple's app store at the time of the taping. It's an interesting app. Um uh by the way open a
00:27:22
chip designer uh AMD have announced a multibillion dollar partnership uh to collaborate on AI data centers. This is
00:27:28
Lisa Sue. I just recently interviewed her actually. Um, but the fact of getting away with anything they want is
00:27:35
just they still think that. Um, and by the way, OpenAI's dev day will be happening after we tape today. We'll
00:27:40
talk about that more on Friday. But thoughts on this turnabout. I mean, they must have heard holy hell from
00:27:46
everybody. That's my assumption. Well, I've hired hackers and and AI engineers to reverse engineer everything
00:27:53
that Open AI spend money on. I'm calling it closed AI because they have not opted out. They have not opted out. closed.
00:27:59
I mean, you like that they haven't. And by the way, I've disassembled my iPhone. I'm I'm I found
00:28:06
Foxcon in China and I found assemblers because Tim Cook has not opted out. Yeah, he hasn't opted out. I can
00:28:12
I mean, that is just so [ __ ] ridiculous. Shoplifterss. And the notion that I mean, if they were really Adobe did this the right way. Adobe basically started a generative AI, a design AI,
00:28:26
whatever they're called, and said everything on here we've had, we've developed agreements with the initial IP
00:28:33
creators, and it's probably not as complete as a wild west, but you know, everything here the you know, the people
00:28:40
have have agreed to license it to us. And this is this is a moment in time where absolutely they should hit back hard. But unfortunately the smart economic
00:28:53
um decision is just to just to steal from people. But I think this is absolutely a moment to push back. The the other thing I got additional hate
00:29:03
from this. I've been getting a lot of hate this week or I'm very sensitive. I don't know. Maybe it's Sanic speaking. Not sure. Anyways, the I put out a thing
00:29:11
showing a graph. LA is LA is basically turning into the next Detroit with better weather. Yeah. And they sent you that story. Yeah. In the times what the Japanese did to Detroit u
00:29:24
essentially Netflix and now AI as which you had been very vocal about the strike FYI saying this is going to cause untold damage. So it was the strike Netflix and AI but go ahead.
00:29:38
Yeah, I I won't even go there. That literally the the the stupidest people in corporate America ever elected a
00:29:45
position as the WGA who decided I know let's transfer wealth from actors and workers to Netflix and make things worse for us and keep people out of work for
00:29:55
five month five months so they can come back with with no negotiating leverage. Anyways, I if you've seen the numbers,
00:30:03
LA has had a vibrant creative middle class driven by Hollywood and it's not. People think it's Brian Cranson or Tom Cruz. It's not. It's caterers. It's makeup artists. It's lighter. It's
00:30:16
gaffers. It's sound people. People making 80 to 250 grand a year as animators, as costume designers. Yeah. And it's all being cleaned out.
00:30:29
out first by Netflix who moved the majority of the production overseas or to the places with the biggest tax credits.
00:30:35
That's economic arbitrage based on geography. Atlanta, New Jersey are doing Vancouver, Budapest.
00:30:42
The Marvel films. Can you think of anything more American than the Marvel films? You know where they're being filmed? Budapest.
00:30:47
Pinewood Studios outside of England. Los London, too. Yep. Mhm. So, okay. You can't get in the way of
00:30:53
that. It's important geographies. Wait to see what AI does to these guys, right? Because all of a sudden,
00:31:01
all these guys. So, this is LA, San Francisco, the transfer of wealth, there's literally a sucking sign of capital and opportunity from LA to San Francisco right now. And that is those
00:31:15
3,400 people that worked on uh just as as Bezos said, your margin is my opportunity. the the credits in movies are AI's opportunity right now. They're
00:31:27
looking at that and thinking, "Oh my gosh, it's going to be fun." Having said that, I went and saw last night one
00:31:34
battle after the other with with Leonardo DiCaprio, Leo DiCaprio, and I was really mixed on it. These guys, Benio Del Toro and Leonardo DiCaprio and
00:31:45
his daughter, the woman who plays his daughter, who's just so beautiful and such an a good actress. There's so much
00:31:52
talent in it. You can't kind of turn your eyes away from the screen. But it felt to me like an independent movie
00:31:57
that if it didn't had three superstars in it, could have done a half a million dollars after premiering at Sundance to Applause. It didn't feel like
00:32:04
quite frankly, I thought it's I think it's hugely overrated. Yeah. You were looking forward to that. I was really excited about it.
00:32:10
Yeah. But it's just so strange. I don't know if it's I'm aging out. I think literally the big screen is just going to go away.
00:32:17
Yeah. Yeah, I think it's going to be kind of an event thing like going ice skating or rolling. You did well this weekend. We didn't
00:32:22
talk about her album just cuz I was being respectful. But guess who killed it at the box office? Guess who killed
00:32:28
it? Taylor Swift is the number one box office hit with her on She did a deal with AMC. They are raking in the [ __ ] dough. Thank you. Go Taylor.
00:32:39
I'm happy for her. Showgirl, she's so good. Come on. Just think she's good. She's good.
00:32:44
She's an inspiring young woman. I'm happy. But I'm just saying that's who killed it at the box office this weekend. You're Oilia. You are Oilia.
00:32:51
Yeah. Can't believe you haven't listened to it. There's a whole I've had a nickel for every time I've heard that. Um I'm just saying there's there's a penis
00:32:57
song in this album, but go ahead. Uh anyways, um name one thing Taylor Swift doesn't have in her purse. What? Her boyfriend's phone number. Oh, you're funny. She's getting married
00:33:08
in case she's happy ending for Taylor Swift with By the way, the album is excellent and it's killing it. She's
00:33:14
killing it. I'm just saying go back to the box office. Go ahead. Go ahead. So, DiCaprio fails, but Taylor kills it.
00:33:19
Go ahead. Okay. I I just think movies are becoming something like ice skating a Rockefeller Center. You'll do it every couple years
00:33:25
with your kids. Events. Events is right. It's just not and and I remember thinking or if I become so extremely online, I can't sit still for 150 minutes. But there's there's definitely
00:33:38
something very Governor Nuomo either needs a couple things need to happen. I do think Governor Nuomo needs to
00:33:44
supersize the film tax credit or the motion picture tax credit for California to 750.
00:33:50
It was sort of a mini size. It wasn't. It's 750 million bucks for an economy that big. I don't know. For me, I if I were him and I don't know if you could do this, some sort of tax above a
00:34:02
certain amount, i.e. AI that funds the creative community in California because I do think the creative community in LA
00:34:08
is a really valuable part of that fabric. And so the LA, which hasn't been competitive with other regions for 10 or 15 years, is really suffering. And I'm
00:34:18
telling you, they got to call Barry Diller. They got to get lawyers. They have got to go after these guys early
00:34:23
and often because the fact that the head of OpenAI would even suggest people need to opt out. They need to op So let me
00:34:30
get this. There's a there's a there's a house next to me. They look rich. Do they need to purposely opt out of me
00:34:37
breaking in and stealing their [ __ ] Do they do they need to say to me, "No, do not come over and take our shit." I mean
00:34:45
that's that is such that gives you insight into the mentality of these folks that the president basically says
00:34:51
they can molest the other 490 uh companies of the S&P 500 of anything they want and they are protected because what they've decided is what he's decided is that people who come meet
00:35:03
with me who I adore who might be trillionaires and who can turn up or down the algorithms to get me reelected
00:35:09
and I think they will want to get me reelected if they see I let them run unfettered and become worth 400 100
00:35:14
billion instead of 300. He he's just and everybody else I was at this one, you know, this quoteunquote big conference that shall go named a head of a huge athletic brand stood up
00:35:26
and said, "I'm [ __ ] I I can't figure out. We've been diversifying out of China. We we we take our products to Vietnam and Malaysia and then we find out after rrooting our supply chain that
00:35:40
Vietnam's getting hit hard with these new tariffs, right?" and someone stood up and said, "I can coach you around how
00:35:46
to communicate with the White House." And a very, very intelligent journalist said, "This is where America
00:35:54
is." Right. Really, rich people have to coach less rich people on how to get favors from
00:36:01
the White House. That's right. That's exactly where we are. That's where we are. Yep. That's exactly where we are. Let me just say one more. The numbers are
00:36:07
really interesting. Um, so John Dwayne Johnson also opened a movie called Smashing Machine. It's $6 million is all
00:36:15
he made. And Showgirl, which was a cinematic experience. It was not a concert film. It wasn't a dock. It was
00:36:21
just a promotional stunt. Took in $46 million across uh the globe and she gets a whole chunk of that. So I mean things are at you have to have events there ways to supersede these people who are
00:36:35
stealing your stuff. um or the White House that is trying to [ __ ] you by doing favors is is is a really bad
00:36:42
economic environment unless you have an event or something so good that people or a fan base so big that it's going to
00:36:49
make you money. It's really something. It really is. I have I listen I had a friend who's like I want to get on the
00:36:55
Tik Tok deal and that I after telling me how dirty it was, it's like I still want to get in on it. Like
00:37:01
I would have asked I I I said the same thing at this conference. So I raised my hand and said, "Can you give me advice on how Democratic professors can invest
00:37:07
in this Tik Tok deal? How do I get in on TikTok at 60% off?" Yeah, I'm in. Yeah, exactly. This guy was like, "It's dirty, dirty, dirty. I want in." That kind of Oh, 100%. I don't want to disarm
00:37:19
unilaterally, but what's happening there's I mean, Hollywood's being so reshaped. And I was
00:37:25
thinking, I was adding up our numbers because I love to talk about how awesome we are. We get 400,000 downloads after a
00:37:31
month. We have 70% of the core demographic. The people are still in their mating ears and spending money on
00:37:37
stupid [ __ ] So that's 280,000 280,000 people in the core demographic. Do you know what CNN prime time gets in the core demographic on average? 26,000
00:37:48
87,000. Yeah, something like that. Yeah, we're getting triple the number of people in the core demographic. Granted,
00:37:54
it's only for an hour and 10 minutes, and they're on for 4 hours. But what do you think the cost of the means of production is for four hours of
00:38:00
prime time CNN? Got it. We're not nearly as good-looking. We don't have nearly as good of makeup. The
00:38:05
sets aren't as good. Fine. But this is you are going to see cable news. Cable news and the big screen, quote unquote TV, are going to be companies owned by billionaires. And I
00:38:18
keep meeting documentary filmmakers. And I'm like, "Oh, that means your husband's rich." which does not go over well.
00:38:24
doesn't um it means you're married to someone very wealthy and but the the big screen
00:38:32
going away and I do think that there is something there is a social there's a social need the the the middle class creative community in Southern
00:38:45
California is a really valuable important part they've made so much magic they have
00:38:51
just as we bailed out the automobile companies I I think we should be thinking about a thoughtful means of
00:38:56
transferring some capital back from Northern California to Southern California. They're not going to do that. They're not going to do that. Well, they don't have any political
00:39:02
power. David Zazlov and Bob Iger aren't aren't having aren't aren't giving the rubbing tug to
00:39:09
President Trump. They're not invited. All he does is get angry at him and they bend over and give
00:39:14
him 14 million bucks. Yeah. Yeah. Well, we'll see. All right. Uh, let's go on a quick break and when
00:39:21
we come back, Elon's Netflix boycott. Uh, Scott, we're back with more news. Let's talk about what Elon has been up
00:39:27
to lately. First off, Netflix stock is down 4% in the last 5 days at the time of this taping after Elon urged followers to cancel subscriptions over
00:39:34
animated show that features a trans character. The show Dead End Paranormal Park was cancelled in 2023 after two
00:39:41
seasons. Um, you know, again, it was also over the over the over the threat by Trump to uh tax um to tariff uh movies. Uh but you know, he's carrying
00:39:52
on his little boycotts all over the place. Secondly, meanwhile, uh newly unveiled testimony revealed that SpaceX
00:39:58
took money from Chinese investors despite having close ties to the US military. A major SpaceX investor said
00:40:03
in a deposition that some of the Chinese investors are listed as shareholders. In March, ProPublica reported that SpaceX
00:40:09
allows Chinese investors to buy a stake in the company as long as the funds are rooted through offshore hubs. Um, they
00:40:15
also, one of the things that I want to add, now these are three different things. SpaceX acquisition of Telecom,
00:40:20
Echo Stars, Spectrum writes, a recent Washington Post opinion piece highlights how the deal could change between state
00:40:26
and citizen citizens. The buy allows for direct satellite to smartphone connectivity without terrestrial in
00:40:32
infrastructure. with the acquisition, SpaceX now controls enough spectrum to supply commercial uh mobile services
00:40:38
globally. Uh they're very good at that as you have pointed out. So start with the first one, the transing. I just
00:40:43
think he's a terrible person and he should be call and apologize to his daughter. That's he's just a terrible
00:40:50
person and a terrible parent and he's obsessed with trans issues in a way that's makes JK Rowling look reasonable.
00:40:57
Uh this the second one of course he's taking money from Chinese investors because well and the last one I think is
00:41:04
a really important story but go ahead you go first. Well I just I don't remember the last one but I take money from you know how I
00:41:10
feel about this. I think I I think that I I opt for the material and psychological well-being of Americans above almost everything else. And I like
00:41:22
taking capital from almost anybody. And as long as you put in a place that they can't control stuff, I I think the
00:41:29
Americans don't realize the connection between their prosperity and the fact that our cost of cap you can't get a
00:41:35
mortgage in Argentina. You just there's no such thing as a mortgage market in Argentina. You can't buy a h so how many
00:41:41
people can buy a house when you can't borrow to b to buy a house because there's no capital flowing into Argentina.
00:41:47
So I'm kind of like cash their check, put in safeguards such that they can't control the media. But I like the fact
00:41:52
that we have huge capital inflows and I find that a lot of times people on the left are not focused enough on our
00:41:58
economic well-being and want to virtue signal. Having said that, let's go to the the one of the greatest exports
00:42:05
unfortunately now, not the greatest, the biggest exports of the United States is American citizens like Elon Musk
00:42:12
exporting political division. Yeah. There was a rally here in the UK and and Elon Musk shows up. I want Britain to be great again. It's like Jesus Christ, we're we're exporting this
00:42:23
[ __ ] right? I think the commercial opportunity, the Chevrolet Equinox EV is the third
00:42:30
bestselling. If I were Chevrolet, I would be making lie to this and say, "Buy any Chevrolet EV. Free lifetime
00:42:36
subscription to Netflix." Oh, yeah. I would just I I would I like targeted economic strikes. I'm a fan of it now over political issues. I I
00:42:48
just think that's that's what he says he's doing. I assume, right? Correct. Yeah. Uh more power, you know, fine. I
00:42:54
don't believe I don't believe in why he's doing it, but I think that Chevrolet and Netflix should strike back. I think Ted Sando should say,
00:43:01
"We're offering free Netflix for anyone who buys these the other seven bestselling EVs." He's smarter than
00:43:08
that. He's not going to weigh into this. He's just gonna ignore it. Because I'll tell you one thing, uh people may love
00:43:13
their Tesla, they love their Netflix more. They do. I mean, it's like I do love my Netflix.
00:43:20
Oh, it's fantastic. I do love my Netflix. It's fantastic. Unfortunately, I've been subject to Wednesday. God, that's a lot
00:43:25
a lot of talent in that. Yeah, a lot of talent in Wednesday. Anyways, um I I don't I I think that
00:43:33
also I think for the most part Elon Musk has only been in the news like every 48
00:43:38
hours, and I think he hates that. So, I think this goes nowhere. I think this is a bit of a non-event.
00:43:43
Yeah. And what about the um what about the Echoar thing? That to me was really interesting. The ability to offer cell
00:43:49
phones, big deal. I think it strikes me that I would hate to be Verizon or AT&T right now. So I'm an investor in Andrew Yang's MBNO,
00:44:00
Noble Mobile, but basically essentially since the cost to build out and this is good. I think this is good regulation. the cost to build out a cellular network and broadband is so expensive that these
00:44:14
companies convinced regulators to say there's going to be a small number of them and they said fine but they said if
00:44:21
there's only going to be two or three global national networks you have to be able to lease them out at competitive
00:44:26
rates to MBNO so Mint Mobile is basically renting the same network that that Andrew is at noble mobile and they come up with different features different like Andrew's company is
00:44:39
saying, "We'll give you money back if you're not on your phone." Like, "Get off your phone." And I think that's the
00:44:45
way to do regulation. I would hate to be AT&T and Verizon right now because whether it's WhatsApp, which is now I think the largest telco in the world and the ability of new technologies to
00:44:57
communicate kind of seamlessly using ubiquitous technology and not I mean carrot my AT&T bill I'm not I'm not exaggerating here. my AT&T bill each
00:45:09
month and I'm switching to Noble next week. Of course, I've got to find someone young to help me actually figure out how to switch my phone service. It's
00:45:16
four to I know. Well, here I am. Here I am. Call me. It's I I don't I I'm scared of my
00:45:23
microwave. Anyways, it's $4 to $600 a month. I'm spending $400 to $600 a month on AT&T. Yeah. And And Andrew called me and said, "I think we can get you down. I have to get
00:45:34
the international plan and all that." It thinks I think I can get it down to 70 or 80 bucks. And by the way, it's going to rest on the same network. Well,
00:45:40
actually, it'll rest on the T-Mobile network, not the AT&T network. So, AT&T and Verizon have been terrible
00:45:46
performing stocks because they have a cost infrastructure and overhead that just doesn't recognize what's happened.
00:45:52
I do cuz I have all my kids on mine and it's a lot of money. It's a lot of [ __ ] money. Like, it really is. I'm
00:45:58
like, what am I paying for exactly? There's there's a huge Speaking of opportunity, there's a huge opportunity. I think this is a really smart thing.
00:46:05
The thing the thing is it's attached to Elon again and even but then Starlink does really well even though it's attached to Elon because it's a superior
00:46:11
product and Tesla is no longer a superior product is the is the issue and when you have a choice
00:46:17
uh you you go with the one who doesn't irritate you hugely. Um but you're right you're right this is interesting one
00:46:23
quick thing I think we have to talk about Instagram safety measures for kids uh are woefully inadequate according to
00:46:28
a new report from former Meta whistleblower along with nonprofit groups. The report evaluated 47 of
00:46:34
Meta's 53 safety features for teens and found a majority were no longer available or ineffect or they were
00:46:40
ineffective. Meta has called the report misleading and dangerously speculative. Um, you know, I'm going to hear from
00:46:46
them after we talk about this, but um, uh, you know, are they this is I think it goes to the heart of what Scott and I talk about is they are going to make things safe for kids. It's almost
00:46:57
impossible to make them safe for kids, but from a cost perspective, they cannot like there's so many holes in all these
00:47:04
things. Um that it's I I think it's an impossible thing. And as Scott and I have talked about, they should not be
00:47:10
serving young people. They have no responsibility. They've shown themselves not to have responsibility. And even
00:47:16
when they're trying, it's hard to do. So, I I I just it creates a really bad situation for young people on these social media networks, which are pound-for-pound negative uh for our
00:47:26
kids. They're not very positive for us either. Um in some cases they are um to be fair. Uh your thoughts um about their ability to make things safe for young
00:47:37
people? Well, to me that this is pretty simple. No one under the age of 16 should be
00:47:44
allowed on a social media platform. And if it we find out that your agegating isn't I I can be talking about our pivot
00:47:52
tour and I get served an ad for our pivot tour, but they claim they can't they can't agegate. No one under the age
00:47:58
of 16 on a social media platform. No one under the age of 18 can engage in a synthetic relationship. Full stop. Let's
00:48:05
not no more safety protocols. No more technology. No more no more parental controls. These things are we agegate alcohol, pornography, the military, motorcycles, R-rated content,
00:48:18
the damage these things have done. And the unfortunate thing is that you say, well, they come in with the argument
00:48:24
around parenting. Well, this is about good parenting. You don't want your kids on screens, don't let them on it. Here's the problem. If you take your kid off a
00:48:32
snap and every other kid is still on SNAP, that kid actually ends up more depressed because he's isolated. Unless
00:48:37
this is collective action from the government or from schools, it's not going to work.
00:48:43
Yeah. And there's just evidence everywhere showing that when social went on mobile, things got worse for teens,
00:48:49
right? So, this is an easy one. If if we outlawed if we made it such that you kids I mean the reality is kids smoking if you quit smoking by the time you're
00:49:00
30 you're okay. Your rates of cancer are the same as someone who never smoked. But the
00:49:06
problem is you can get addicted. A 15-year-old smoking cigarettes that is less dangerous than a 15-year-old in my
00:49:13
view on Instagram. Yeah. And so, all right, look what we did to cigarettes. Why is it taking us so long
00:49:19
with social? And typically, I think it's about to happen. And it is happening, I think, largely because of Jonathan
00:49:24
Height's book, The Anxious Generation. But generally speaking, society takes 20 years. It takes it took us 20 years with
00:49:30
cigarettes. It took us 20 years with opiates. And it feels like the iPhone has taken us about 20 years.
00:49:37
Yeah, I agree. But I think it's happening. But all this nonsense around parental controls and parenting, no, no, no. Easy. Under the
00:49:44
age of 16, no social media. Under the age of 18, no synthetic relationship. They're always going to get caught out on these things. It's And parental
00:49:50
controls. I am really good at it and they're not good. And let me say, there was a great piece actually on CBS this
00:49:56
morning on uh on on schools without phones. They are happier. They are happier. Everyone's happier without
00:50:01
them. Actually, one of my sons, I'm not going to say which one, wrote me and and was being a little crazy on the phone about some topics and and he was and he
00:50:09
wrote me a little bit later. He texted me. He goes, "You know, I'm on this phone too much. It's making me crazy."
00:50:14
Like, and I was like, "Yes, thank you." Like, he he self- diagnosed himself and he's older. Um, but he was uh it got him
00:50:22
all going, right? It got him all like like that kind of thing. And so, you can't help but doom scroll and be angry. And it happens to all of us, including
00:50:32
me. I actually have, interestingly enough, my threads is so full of like cooking and ASMR that I hardly ever see
00:50:40
news on it, which is interesting. Um, which I which I like, right? It's actually very calming and I don't ever
00:50:46
see angry stuff, but Scott and I are pretty clear on this. And by the way, Jonathan Hate's book is
00:50:52
uh I think is critically important to this, but your book we'll be talking about a lot on the tour, so we'll be talking about these topics. Uh, notes,
00:51:00
notes on being a man. Is that correct? Notes on being a man. Uh, thanks for that. Yeah. Yeah, we'll be talking. It's during
00:51:05
Scott's uh uh debut week and we hope to get it to the number one on the New York Times bestseller list with our tour and
00:51:11
everything else. Care, I don't I don't give into the commercial metrics of a modern day. I still want it's my personal
00:51:17
I just hope that I just hope that people find some reward in it. All right, Scott, one more quick break.
00:51:23
Uh, we'll be back for wins and fails. Okay, Scott, let's hear some wins and fails.
00:51:29
Um, I just wanted to try and wrap a win and fail into discussing a little bit about um Trump's quote unquote compact that offers preferential treatment to
00:51:41
compliant colleges. First off, that's a bit of a misnomer. What they're threatening to do is take away federal
00:51:46
funding from universities that don't sort of sign up for certain um sign up to certain protocols. and I'll go through each of them just sort of quickly and provide a viewpoint. The
00:51:58
first is I think I depart a little bit from some of some of the uh responses from
00:52:04
the last and that is I do think generally speaking that if the federal government is going to give you billions
00:52:09
of dollars they should have input. However, that input needs to be discussed in Congress and passed as laws
00:52:15
that apply to all colleges because at a minimum in 3 years and two months a lot of this [ __ ] just might be reversed. So
00:52:22
this is just darting back and forth trying to figure out what to do. Also, there's a lot of evidence showing that
00:52:27
the funding that these universities get for research has been arguably the best investment in the history of the planet
00:52:33
around pharmaceuticals and technology. But anyways, having said that, uh some of the things they want to do, they want
00:52:39
to make uh admissions basically um gender, ethnicity, race, and political view blind. And I don't have a problem with that because basically the Supreme
00:52:51
Court has already said that's that's what's that's what it has to be. Um I do believe in affirmative action but I believe it should be based on income not based on any observable
00:53:02
um characteristic or uh sexual orientation to marketplace of ideas and civil discourse. They're forcing them to commit to fostering a vibrant marketplace of ideas on campus requiring an intellectually
00:53:15
open campus environment with a broad spectrum of ideological viewpoints present and no single ideology dominant
00:53:21
both along political and other relevant lines. I want to acknowledge that universities have done a really poor job
00:53:30
of fmenting and supporting ideological diversity. Having said that, I don't see how you legislate any attempt to legislate it really is thought control. And just as the cops, police forces, and
00:53:42
the military probably lean conservative, universities are always going to lean progressive. That's just the way it is.
00:53:49
Now, should 90 plus% of your faculty be Democrats, that probably says you need to broaden the spectrum a little bit. I've also seen some bullying on campus where anything outside a certain
00:54:01
narrative is really frowned upon. But I don't see how you implement this sort of thought control. Non-discrimination in
00:54:08
hiring institutions will not be allowed to consider factors such as sex, ethnicity, race, national origin,
00:54:13
disability or religion. I'm I'm quite frankly I'm comfortable with that. I think that that universities what I've
00:54:21
seen in terms of promotions and faculty is that it is not it is not strict it's mostly merit but a lot of times it's not merit and but again there's a better
00:54:35
solution here and the solution quite frankly would be getting rid of tenure because the biggest problem is we don't have enough room for young faculty to
00:54:41
come up through the ranks because old inefficient faculty uh will not leave student learning learning universities must must commit to combating grade inflation. I don't even know what that means. Student equality institutions
00:54:53
must commit to defining and otherwise interpreting male, female, women, and men. You know, people ask me all the
00:54:59
time if I'm Jewish and I because they say you're an atheist and I say I'm Jewish. I'm like, "Well, you're bar mitzvah." No. And they say, "Well, are
00:55:04
you really Jewish?" I'm like, "Well, I get to present as whatever the [ __ ] I want." And my view is anyone if you want
00:55:10
to present people should be able to just present as they want. So, I don't I don't understand why what the big deal is
00:55:17
around not letting people I've always said with respect to pronouns, I do think it's a little bit stupid, but if you want me to call you they, I have no problem with that. That's it's not a big
00:55:28
give. I'll be just fine. You're not infringing on my rights. Then the the big one the one that bothers me the most is that foreign entanglements one of the
00:55:39
conditions is that uh the compact requires that no more than 15% of a university's undergraduate student
00:55:45
population basically shall be foreigners. Okay, that actually won't have that much effect at the
00:55:50
undergraduate level because most universities are not above 15%. It will have a huge impact at the graduate schools where we get a lot. And this is
00:55:57
so contrary to everything they're trying to do because the ultimate luxury item in the world is
00:56:06
not a Rolex watch. It's not a Ferrari. It's sending your kids to an elite university. Well, you will pay, no joke,
00:56:12
between housing and tuition, a half a million dollars into the American economy to send your kid to a foreign
00:56:19
university, an American university where he or she will love America and go back and create connective tissue between us
00:56:25
and foreign nations. And at 90 points plus of gross margin, this is the ultimate high margin export and our ability. Just as I was saying, I love the idea of
00:56:36
foreign capital coming into the US. I love the idea of human capital coming into the US a bet. And then the final
00:56:43
one is they've said they can't raise their prices for five years. I hate price controls from mom dami. I hate
00:56:48
price controls from Trump. There a lot of this in my opinion gets it the right idea. But as as always, it is the wrong execution with a secretary of education
00:57:00
who ran a [ __ ] wrestling league. If you want to bring prices down, you break the cartel. For example, early decision should not be allowed because if someone goes ed in hopes of getting a higher
00:57:13
chance of being admitted, once they're admitted, they have no ability to shop around and shop for prices. Universities
00:57:20
should not be raising their tuitions in lock step. Universities should not be sharing information on financial aid
00:57:25
because all they're doing is transferring leverage from the consumer, the parents, and the kids such that they
00:57:31
can't shop around and get the best price. If you are not growing your freshman class faster than in population
00:57:36
growth, you lose your taxfree status because you're no longer a public servant. You're a hedge fund of the class. There are easier ways, better
00:57:43
ways, more competitive ways to get it bringing the prices down than price caps. We want as many as full freight paying foreign students as possible.
00:57:54
This is the be one of the highest margin exports we have. And the idea of thought
00:57:59
control, I just thought, it just goes to weird places. And by the way, if this isn't done through
00:58:04
Congress, guess what? President Moore, President Nuome, President Basher, they're just going to dial all this [ __ ] back. Right. Exact. It's useless. It's
00:58:15
useless. And it's such This is their shot, I think. All right. Do you have a Oh, was that the win or fail? We have to
00:58:20
get moving. So Oh, sorry. Go ahead. Your turn. What is What is your Is that your win and fail? Yeah, I just I wrapped them. I wrapped
00:58:27
them. Okay. I have I have uh two. Obviously, speaking of thought control, I think my
00:58:32
fail is watching um watching what Open AI did here with this back and forth on copyright. What a mess. What a ridiculous thievery. I'm sorry. I accused Facebook of it. I've accused uh
00:58:44
Google of it. Same thing. This is just ridiculous. You respect copyright. You do not try to build a business up of
00:58:49
other people's things and then act like it's no big deal. It is a big deal. You're stealing other people's things
00:58:55
and the things that are most attractive on your site are copyrighted material that you didn't make. If you want to
00:59:00
make new things, good for you. That's great. But otherwise, you're thieves. You're, as Walt Mossberg says again and
00:59:07
again, they were rapacious information thieves. You don't own this. Get your dirty mitts off of it or pay the people
00:59:12
who made it in the first place. You're killing people's jobs. you're also not going to take their seed corn at the
00:59:18
same time. Um, and I hope that I hope there's all kinds of lawsuits um to do so. And unfortunately, people have to
00:59:24
sue and that puts them at on their back feet, especially when their industries are dying. Um, for my win, obviously
00:59:31
Taylor Swift, I I would recommend watching the Fate of Oilia official music video. It's fantastic. It's a
00:59:37
really great album. I know a lot of white guys are like, "Okay, it's really great, but like they all the reviews are
00:59:43
like you and your identity politics." Ridiculous. They write this. They're like, "This woman is spectacular." And
00:59:50
yet and yet they can't possibly just give her a win. And by the way, 46 billion million dollars at the box
00:59:56
office. That's all I have to say. And in that reign of winning, I also love this guy. There's two things. One is the
01:00:02
Pope. Fantastic winner. um is is this YouTube greeter guy named Troy Hawk who goes around and compliments people and he's built a huge following. I would recommend you watching him. It is so
01:00:14
enjoyable. If I had ankles like that, they would also be on full display. You know what I'm talking about. I love
01:00:20
your shades. You're like a benign motorcycle cop. And I like the way that you're embracing unlikely concepts and
01:00:26
conversations seamlessly just jumping on board my train. This is where social media shines, where
01:00:32
people like this are there. Like whether it's Taylor Swift providing great content, whether it's the YouTube
01:00:37
festival greeter guy, whether it's the Pope. Let me tell you, there's a quote I'm going to read to you, Scott
01:00:42
Galloway, that is very it's probably a little over your head, but I'm I'm going to read it anyway. Where is it? Um uh
01:00:49
there is not any advantage to be won from grim lamentation. That's from Homer. Let's not be grim lamentators here, guys. I don't think that's a word.
01:01:00
Make things win at win at the bottom. Is that something you talk about at your favorite bar in DC? No. No. I'm just saying don't be [ __ ]
01:01:07
grim about it. This ICE people fight back. Be don't sit around. Can we go from Taylor Swift to Ice? What
01:01:13
are we doing here? I am just saying lament. Make things that matter that people buy that do well
01:01:18
economically. Say things that are are lovely to people. Make them feel better. Win by hope. That's all I'm saying. Win
01:01:25
by being great. That's what I would say. Win. Win by being great. Word sister. Word sister. No lamentation. We are not
01:01:33
going to do that. These ice people, [ __ ] them. Let's figure out a way to win. Okay. Reminds me of my favorite poem. There once was a girl from Nantucket. Oh, wait. Never mind. Never mind.
01:01:44
Grim lamentation. We shall not have it. Um I I I noticed you didn't mention your former firm getting dumped by Cracker
01:01:50
Barrel, which is your firm. I forgot about that. Profit, right? I forgot about that. So, well, I came
01:01:57
very quickly tell the story rather quickly. I went to work with Morgan Stanley. Hated it and they hated me. Well, I did
01:02:04
okay there. So, I went back to business school. Business school is for the elite and the aimless. And my second year, I took this course called Brand Strategy
01:02:10
with David Aer. Changed my life and I decided in my second year of business school to start a business called Profit
01:02:15
Brand Strategy and was there for 10 years. Sold my stake. Very proud of it. It's now I think 6 or 700 people and it ends up they were the brand strategy firm who recommended the logo change
01:02:27
and now they're the sacrificial lamb. They just got fired by Cracker Barrel cuz how does a logo become politicized?
01:02:33
I'm not entirely I don't know what happened there but everyone was emailing me based on you the Cracker Barrel guy I
01:02:39
guess cuz he's bald. Yeah, it was clearly it was clearly a nod to me. I'm like at that firm I'm like Trosky. The CEO was a difficult
01:02:47
person and and basically got killed. You got like my name shall not be mentioned at
01:02:52
profit anymore. They had a 30-year re get this. They had a 20-year reunion and then they didn't invite me. I started it
01:02:58
when I was 20 and now it's a Cracker Barrel. Cracker Barrel. Now it's been fired by
01:03:03
Cracker Barrel, which is a unique designation for a company. Anyway, we want to hear from you. Send us your
01:03:08
question about business, tech, or whatever is on your mind. Go to nymag.com/pivot to submit a question for the show or
01:03:14
call 85551 pivot. And reminder, we're going on tour. We're going to be in Toronto. sold out. Sorry.
01:03:20
Toronto, Toronto, Toronto, Boston, New York, DC, Chicago, San Francisco, and LA. Visit pivot
01:03:27
tour.com for tickets. Our show, our tickets are being scalped. They went for 65 bucks. Now they're
01:03:32
going for scalpers and third party sellers. We should have added more nights in certain cities. It's Canadian, so it's like eight bucks.
01:03:38
We're not fans of scalpers. Uh but uh but we we're going to sell out. We are going to sell out, so buy soon. Um, and
01:03:44
elsewhere in the Carara and Scott universe, this week on On with Cara Swisser, I spoke with makeup mogul Bobby
01:03:50
Brown. Let's listen to a clip where she talks about the running of her company. I used to interview every single person,
01:03:56
you know, not every person, but most of the people I would interview. And when all of a sudden these people started
01:04:01
showing up and like, "Hi, I'm your new head of international. Hi, I'm this." And I'm like, "Excuse me?
01:04:07
I didn't meet them. Well, we we we think they're going to be the best for the brand. We think this.
01:04:12
we think this. So I wasn't included in what to me was important which you know was running and growing the brand and when I left it was a billion dollars. It was a growing growing brand. She sold
01:04:26
her her company to Estee Lauder and then eventually after decades lost control of it and then started Jones Road. She's a
01:04:33
really interesting entrepreneur. It's a great discussion. Uh okay that's the show. Thanks for listening to Pivot. Be
01:04:38
sure to like and subscribe to our YouTube channel. We'll be back on Friday. Scott, read us out.
01:04:43
Today's show was produced by Lara Neman, Zoe Marcus, and Taylor Griffin. Ernie or Todd engineered this episode. Jim ML
01:04:50
edited the video. Thanks also to Dubose, Miss and Dan Shalon, the Shock Karas, Vox Media's executive producer of
01:04:55
podcast. Make sure to follow Pivot on your favorite podcast platform. Thanks for listening to Pivot from New York
01:05:00
Magazine and Vox Media. You can subscribe to the magazine at nymag.com/pod. We'll be back later this week for another breakdown of all things tech and business. Carol, I'll see you later in the week.