This week on Dead Cat, hosts Tom Dotan and Eric Newcomer dive into social media wedding bans. The evolution of authenticity on BeReal. The state of TikTok. Media self-absorption. Dimes Square. Andrew Tate.
Then we delve into Sam Bankman-Fried’s case against the startup world — what he calls “the financial circle-jerk.”
Give it a listen.
Get full access to Newcomer at www.newcomer.co/subscribe
00:00:06
Welcome Sally. Hey everybody.
00:00:14
Welcome to Dead cat. It's Tom dote on here.
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Hey everybody! Welcome to.
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Let's write that you want you on my low voice intro.
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I'm relaxed after a week off. So that's that's my unstressed
00:00:25
voice. Its naturally higher, it's a
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chill, it's a chill Alto. I have no grounds to criticize
00:00:32
Tom's podcast voice given. I'm like, yeah, I'm saying,
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like, and sort of every other 10 seconds, I do my best.
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I don't think, I don't see many things, I just say it on a,
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maybe more soothing tone of you, and I don't voice too.
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Yeah, there are Millennial vocal fry but anyway, I am back after
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a week off Kitty and Eric had another episode in which they
00:00:52
talked about things that I really should have been
00:00:53
participating in but I wasn't there.
00:00:57
It's the most frustrating episodes for me.
00:00:59
I don't mind. Being on the show but at least
00:01:01
talk about things. I don't give a shit about, I
00:01:02
give you credit, you know, literal stories, I've written
00:01:05
the murder most successful story I've ever had, by the way, in
00:01:08
terms of readership and it was very interesting to see how it
00:01:11
played out because the story came out, this was a story I
00:01:13
wrote in 2015 or 16 or something and it was about a murder that
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happened in Arkansas and the police subpoenaed an Amazon Echo
00:01:24
to see if there was any evidence on there to prove that the guy,
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you know, murdered the person in his hot tub.
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So The story came out like Christmas the day after
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Christmas and every news Outlet picked up on it and every TV
00:01:35
show picked up on, like Morning News show picked up that's real
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power, but none of them gave him the Today Show or something.
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So I came at it, that's, that's it each and they hold out there.
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You know, like oh here is, you know, Carolyn our Tech reporter
00:01:47
and it's like this bucket like seven year old woman and she's
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got like an echo next to her and she's like talking about like
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that's her prop to explain this thing zero credit given.
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That's okay, it's fine. I did, I did, I did do some
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radio. Is actually a hilariously
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enough. One of the radio interviews I
00:02:02
did about the story. I had set an alarm on my echo
00:02:06
for unrelated reasons, and it went off in the middle of the
00:02:08
interview and it sounded like use like snooping on me.
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Yeah that works. Well yeah.
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Anyway anyway, we're not going to rehash all that.
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Yeah but good episode. I recommend everyone listen to
00:02:20
this. Listen we're cross promoting our
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own episodes, it's like go back to the pack.
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Have some people, there's some good stuff in there, you know?
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We probably tuned out when they saw it wasn't in the episode.
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They're Like oh Humphrey one. You know how it goes sometimes.
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Anyway, I missed out on a lot. I feel like while I was gone,
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the new cycle was insane. I think it really specially
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insane, this last week in financial world, if you'll so
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slow the markets up, the markets up, but the story is still that.
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It's the end of the world. So how do you write that?
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Like I'm like stuck. It's up like 15%.
00:02:52
Yeah, I guess that in a much shorter than Mark anyway.
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Sorry, I know you think about broader societal things but I
00:02:58
just wanted to complain. How do you write the story of
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the downturn during? I mean I think it's a dead cat
00:03:04
bounce. But like that's that's basically
00:03:06
why I said I my most recent news letter that the stock market
00:03:09
rebounds, you know, on the way down, but it's very hard for
00:03:12
narrative purposes because everybody gets excited.
00:03:14
When I say the new cycle was insane.
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I probably would just reacting to like surprising earnings from
00:03:20
a couple of companies that I pay attention to and then the Trump
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shit, and then, you know, the Trump FBI stuff.
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The thing that was crossing, crossing my mind while I was on
00:03:29
vacation, which also, by the way, I told you guys where we
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can from the episode was like an ongoing jokes pretending.
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This was like is it a secret? Or it was a social media secret,
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that's what you're getting to. Yeah, it's so easy to media
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media secret. They only gave they gave a
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guidance about social media. Was there a guy dressed about
00:03:47
your podcast? Is that count as social that
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we've been very specific to me? They were very, very general.
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I went to my brother's wedding, I can say that and we were in a
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destination. Well, I'll just say and then
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seven can bleep it out which would be funny, but I was in a
00:04:00
Then and we should, we redact, we redact serious information at
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this anyway, so I was there and there was a social media
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blackout on my brother's wedding, but if your first was,
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my wife is. But a mere Schools teacher, no
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sir, right? But it was for personal reasons,
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but it did sort of make me think, as I was in this
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beautiful location, you know, gotta do something like the
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brain turns towards. How could I leverage the
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location? That I'm at.
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And I was like, well I guess I can post it be real.
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That one seems acceptable in most situations you so just you
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think be real, doesn't count as social media in this context
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because it's a smaller Circle. I yeah, I think for the specific
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reasons that I needed to have a social media blackout, be real,
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would not have violated any of those concerns and so and
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because I felt like I needed to do it.
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So then I decided post to be real, then I was like, look, I'm
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sitting down You know, on the beach looking at palm trees and
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like a did you post has blue lagoon?
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I did eventually. Yeah, it's a might be real from
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a couple of nights ago. You don't even I don't think of
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you as a social media person that would have like, such
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withdrawals that you would feel the need to find some Outlet.
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It's just a thing that your mind wanders, too, when you're bored,
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right? I mean, at some points, you're
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just like, well, I'm not reading right now and I'm not on
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Twitter. So what else do I do?
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And I'm like, oh, I guess I could.
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Create content it's not working posted like literally every meal
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that I ate in Italy to my stories while I was there
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Instagram. Yeah.
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Yeah right. So and I'm off Instagram.
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I am on Tick-Tock Again by the way I have downloaded techshop.
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We can talk about that too. I have I have lots of thoughts
00:05:49
about Tick-Tock but anyway so I posted it.
00:05:51
I was going to post to be real and I was like no this is too
00:05:53
nice for be real because it seems to me the point of this
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app is to expose the Danity of your life it's because it's
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supposed to be in the moment. You don't want it to look good A
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lot of it is just like oh, it's me in an Uber with me from
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people who don't have be real, you know, it's sort of at a
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certain time of day. They say take a picture
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immediately and you take it sort of forward and backwards.
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So you get sort of where you're sitting and what you're looking
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at Short of very real. There's been a lot of hysterical
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reporting recently this worried that people are posting
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corporate secrets to their be real because they're just
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sitting in front of their work. A computer when this happens and
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they they put their McKinsey slides or whatever out there for
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I mean that probably has happened right, you know scary
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stories about yeah, I mean, yeah, but yeah people have
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decided that it is the app does your and I saw the information
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or some Outlet had growth rate figures or her I wrote about
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this company before anyone was paying I've scooped the seed and
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series a round of this company. Anyway, who's our best friend
00:06:53
that's like a tick for me. My tick is like bringing out my
00:06:57
scoop that was clear in the Emil interview to it was We're
00:07:00
talking about these huge stakes and I'm like, scoop that was a
00:07:02
scoop of mine. I believe.
00:07:04
Anyway sorry that's that's not unique to you though.
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That's a that's a specific order.
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It's a rewarder problem, it's disease but it's good.
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I mean that's you know, it's our, I don't know it's part of
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what we're solid anyway. What were you asking me?
00:07:16
So be real people. Its growth is big now and it's
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valued at like, what is it 600 million or something?
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It's like a large purse. Anyway, I decided not to post it
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because I felt like it was a violation of the spirit of the
00:07:29
Which is things needle. Look boring, right?
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The point of it is to show people that there is, you know,
00:07:34
between the highlights on Instagram or whatever the fuck,
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you know, really. You're not doing anything
00:07:40
interesting and you're living meaning of life, I was watching
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a tick, tock the other day about be real, which really speaks to
00:07:46
sort of the media environment, where in, but I think you told
00:07:49
me about that and that maybe feeds into what I've been
00:07:51
thinking about since then, which is that the next social media
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Trend piece, like the a head from The Wall Street Journal is
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going to be That Sensation that I felt, which is that.
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Oh, my life is too interesting for be real.
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I shouldn't post it there, but that is also the app of the day
00:08:08
that you need to be posting on and so people influencers, which
00:08:11
have spent the last five or so years, you know, glowing up
00:08:14
their lives to make it interesting to people in a like
00:08:17
celebrity standpoint are now going to have to dumb it down
00:08:21
and like dull it so that they can fit, you know, the
00:08:23
expectations of be real. And I think there are going to
00:08:27
be like reality, Since right on unfollow all the hot people, you
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know. Like if you're single and
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dating, you can't have all these people.
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You're trying to woo because all of a sudden it's going to
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corrupt your be real. That was sort of that was The
00:08:41
Tick Tock version of what you're saying.
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But yeah, that whether it's building a following or whether
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it's sort of caring too much about who's following you and
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trying to sell yourself to them, it's sort of ruins.
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You know. It's not the days when it was
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just be real seed investors you know.
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Now it's you have to care what Think o, but The Tick-Tock was
00:09:01
trying to say like you will make your be reels better if you
00:09:03
spend less time paying attention to celebrities, we're know just
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like if there are people like, if there are boys that you want
00:09:11
to be pursuing you then it's going to cause you to like
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really care about your be real presentation.
00:09:18
Is there going to be consuming them and sort of just like I
00:09:21
mean just you know depending on the audience whatever what the
00:09:28
pendulum is going to switch. This happens during recessions.
00:09:31
I find. Right, like, displays of immense
00:09:34
wealth or out of fashion, and I remember, like, after 2008.
00:09:38
There were all these stories about how, like, all these
00:09:39
Bankers didn't want to, like, wear expensive watches or have
00:09:43
nice suits because everyone was mad at the finance industry for
00:09:47
fucking everything up. But also, like still being rich,
00:09:49
while people were being evicted from their homes and I think if
00:09:52
we do enter a recession, people are going to call it, you know,
00:09:55
you know, Instagram fabulous lives are out and be real.
00:10:00
You know, media ality is in and that but yeah we've already got
00:10:04
like this shitty selfie and you know, yeah I think that I think
00:10:07
that's the trend right now, right?
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But the thing is that influencers you know they exist
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solely on top of these social media platforms as their
00:10:15
business and so they're going to have to adapt for be real and
00:10:18
they can't be what they have done in the last couple of
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years. Again, gonna be real, I can't,
00:10:23
well, literally they cannot write.
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I mean, I don't think, you know, given Google that was hysterical
00:10:27
thing with the with the cardassians were there.
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Like Instagram is supposed to be for your friends, you know.
00:10:33
And we are yeah, like, what friend?
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Yeah, do it. This will this will happen.
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Mark my words I probably I should just write this story.
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I'm moving to a new beat which would allow for these kinds of
00:10:47
pieces but someone's going to do it.
00:10:49
And this is what we're going to be living in to the next, but
00:10:50
you need a word. If you like chuji, okay, Woody
00:10:56
Allen consultant the word for for what I'm just saying the
00:11:00
best friend. Stories have a clear word, the
00:11:03
vibe shift. Yeah, I feel like people have,
00:11:06
you know, used abused that phrase like ever since it came
00:11:10
out. Everything is like part of the
00:11:12
vibe shift even though nobody knows what we're shifting to.
00:11:15
Yeah. That definitely ran.
00:11:16
Its course, The Vibes I mean Vibe is a concept was funny to
00:11:21
me at first generally is like it's inexplicable and it
00:11:24
describes people who are just sort of out of touch but seem to
00:11:27
be having a good time. But the vibes Shift.
00:11:30
And they was like that. Famous, New York Magazine story
00:11:33
that like pushed it, and everyone was so excited about
00:11:35
that record came from. I think that was the vibe shift,
00:11:38
five shift came from there, but everyone loved it and I never
00:11:41
liked it was supposed to be this, like, agreed-upon Concepts
00:11:44
that everyone is like, oh yeah, no one can describe what we know
00:11:46
it's something and that's really funny.
00:11:48
I'm like, yeah, but fine, but that's not a great piece than if
00:11:51
no one it does. Right grab anything.
00:11:53
That's why it's been so abused because everywhere I can use it
00:11:56
for anything. And, and now it's to the point
00:11:59
where, you know, Like old editors just know that it's
00:12:01
like, a catchy thing that will get people to sort of engage
00:12:05
with the, this story, which is probably why.
00:12:07
It'll it'll be like, in the nut graph of the, a head about the
00:12:10
be real, you know, the rise of be real reality Consultants,
00:12:14
because the editors will be like, oh, what's this Vibe shift
00:12:16
up in here, right? Exact that, at least agree that
00:12:20
you won't be writing the cool story.
00:12:21
If you say Vibe, shift. I mean, I wanted to, I don't
00:12:25
know if there's a tangent or not we can we don't have to go into
00:12:27
this. But are you following the hole?
00:12:29
Like dime Square issue? No, tell me about.
00:12:33
I saw the headline or the tweets, but I didn't click on
00:12:35
the article. What I mean was Times Square, is
00:12:37
like a sub. It's like a very Niche part of
00:12:43
New York. I think it's associated with the
00:12:46
Red Scare podcast. There was this, like, I think a
00:12:50
dime Square newspaper, that Ben Smith wrote about, if you
00:12:53
remember that, there was a whole back-and-forth there.
00:12:56
I mean, there's some crazy sub Stacks that I've read.
00:12:59
Going through like all this like leftist arthouse drama I think
00:13:04
affiliated with diamond Square. They're all these podcasts,
00:13:07
their podcast way more popular than ours about this like fake
00:13:10
made up small community. Okay so that that's going on.
00:13:15
I mean why is it called Times Square?
00:13:17
Is it because it's full of hot people or know.
00:13:19
I think a dime because I think it's like a I think it's a
00:13:22
geographic it's like a ripoff of I think it's like Lower
00:13:26
Manhattan and it's like a sort of times.
00:13:29
Square. Like but it's you know this is a
00:13:31
shitty part of town. So it's Times Square.
00:13:33
I think like I think it's like our immediate neighborhood and
00:13:36
it but yeah. So and then Taylor Lorenz,
00:13:39
tailored Lorenz sort of observed, you know, this is this
00:13:44
is all fake, you know, the media is just interested in like
00:13:47
talking about people adjacent to itself and blah blah blah blah
00:13:52
which is obviously true. But I think if anything what's
00:13:55
been weird about this time, is it used to be that like Elite me
00:13:59
You could just like, I don't know, whip out The Fad or say,
00:14:03
like this is happening now, and then it was like a fun thing,
00:14:06
and that's what the vibe shift was.
00:14:08
But the problem was that given that there isn't sort of the
00:14:11
same command and control sort of media environment.
00:14:15
They couldn't really dictate it. So, they just sort of said, it
00:14:18
seems like something's changing people want.
00:14:21
I think what was happening, this is my view, I think people want
00:14:24
sort of to be told that like the culture is moving here, like
00:14:29
here's the new. A cool thing like that, people
00:14:31
are fatigued of this period where there is no, you know,
00:14:35
we're just consuming all all old, you know, the 90s, the
00:14:38
eighth, you know, everybody's consuming all the old content so
00:14:41
there's nothing like they've feels of this time.
00:14:44
People want sort of somebody to say this is what it's all about.
00:14:47
These are the characters were obsessed with it aren't, you
00:14:50
know, Donald Trump and so that's like this whole like that's like
00:14:53
the dime squares and stuff, but the media I feel like
00:14:56
everything's been so I don't know, but time.
00:14:59
It seems like it's just a pure abstraction, right?
00:15:01
Like it's a commentary on the lack of an identifiable Trend by
00:15:07
claiming something exists. That doesn't really other than
00:15:10
for the fact that people are making fun of the fact that it
00:15:13
doesn't exist. Right.
00:15:14
I mean is that that sort of the witches exist because people
00:15:16
start writing about in creating content around it and then
00:15:19
people get invested in, you know, it's like professional
00:15:22
wrestling or something. I mean it's like we went to the
00:15:25
no, you weren't there, I went to a party with who's the one who
00:15:28
sells snake oil care? Align Callaway or whatever.
00:15:31
Like I feel like she's you don't follow her.
00:15:33
This is Caroline Calloway. She like, I think she wrote a
00:15:37
book called like scammer, you know, she's like a famous like
00:15:40
minor scam. You know.
00:15:41
She's anyway. Okay.
00:15:43
Well yeah, they're all these characters.
00:15:45
I mean, I feel like in social media world right now, you know,
00:15:50
you, you know, who is the most? Like, I feel like a phenomenon
00:15:54
on my Tick Tock while we're just observing social media.
00:15:57
Is that I see the reaction to the trend before I see the
00:16:01
trend. Do you experience this all the
00:16:04
time? Because the reaction is much
00:16:05
larger than the trend and because we're yeah, we is, were
00:16:08
in the demographic of reaction. I think it's both that.
00:16:12
But who is your Tick-Tock reacting to right now?
00:16:16
Well I'm bad. I'm a bad taste test case here
00:16:19
because I'm so new to tick tock and I think the app is still
00:16:23
trying to figure out who the fuck I am and so like it's full
00:16:27
of Is Andrew Tate on your radar? No, I don't know what
00:16:30
characters. Oh my God.
00:16:32
This is coming. He's, it's like a terrible
00:16:36
terrible men's rights guy, but literally Andrew Tate was on a
00:16:41
podcast and that pot has immediate like just had Elon
00:16:45
Musk on or is going to after this.
00:16:47
And Andrew Tate has been on like, he was honestly, like,
00:16:51
it's like a Steven Crowder time. I don't know.
00:16:54
He's like, he's bad. I mean it's like but it's just
00:16:57
like Like, you know, it's like the game, you know, it's like
00:17:00
any of these sort of like, pickup artist sort of things
00:17:03
like on steroids, and I think all these content creators just
00:17:07
like, it is, you know, something to Pivot off of.
00:17:09
It's just like another. I don't know what it is, it's
00:17:13
deeply troubling. But if he's eyeing present, he's
00:17:17
omnipresent like, I mean, it's just like, yeah, it's yeah.
00:17:22
And people just seized on whatever the storyline is to
00:17:26
build a universe out of Well, so, but back to the dime Square
00:17:30
thing. I mean, the idea that people are
00:17:33
claiming that something exists that doesn't really exist.
00:17:36
But keep writing about it enough that they could eventually will
00:17:38
it into existence or have enough people follow it.
00:17:41
That it seems like a real entity, it's not like it's a
00:17:44
pretty small jump between that and Q and on to me, right?
00:17:47
Like I've always viewed the coming down through exist.
00:17:49
Like there are people who are like in the circle or whatever
00:17:53
like it's just like 30 people are so, you know, I don't know.
00:17:57
Yeah, well, I mean, I guess you could say there are some
00:18:01
elements of Q and A but Jeffrey Epstein and that sort of stuff
00:18:04
that like exists, you know, to say that there are people like
00:18:08
Elites in the world that do things that are gross.
00:18:11
And there is like far more of that than people are willing to
00:18:14
accept. But I'm just talking about the
00:18:16
larger mass of people that is find the concept interesting and
00:18:19
decide to claim it exists because it gives them
00:18:22
entertainment. Basically the same.
00:18:24
It's hard to distinguish between the people who are genuine Is
00:18:28
and the ones who just like are entertained by it.
00:18:30
And ultimately it doesn't really matter if it would put that I
00:18:33
think this is what you're saying.
00:18:36
There's an argument that some of the media obsession over q and
00:18:38
on was because the media wants to be able to criticize Trump
00:18:43
people for being total. Loony Bin's.
00:18:45
So it's like, okay, we're going to underline this.
00:18:48
I mean, I don't actually agree with this view.
00:18:49
I think you and on was pretty sizable like a big, a big
00:18:53
contingent of the Trump. Ace believed in it came up a
00:18:56
lot. Dime Square.
00:18:58
I don't think we're ever going to see, you know, a day where I
00:19:02
don't know, Democratic Party politics are, I mean, that's the
00:19:05
thing, the dime Square world, the Red Scare world of anything.
00:19:08
Like, part of the trend is like, flirtation with the right
00:19:11
despite professing to be like, you know, communist, you know,
00:19:14
that's sort of any way that it's a right.
00:19:17
And you're gonna go down that road, and there's obviously a
00:19:21
distinction between Democratic Party politics and like the
00:19:23
leftist podcast world. But back to The Tick-Tock
00:19:26
because I did reach It because I am now covering YouTube and it
00:19:31
would seem like I'm just not doing my job if I'm not aware of
00:19:35
the be because basically take do it.
00:19:37
Can we have Sirens going off your like chain beat change
00:19:40
older? I think I said changing, so you
00:19:42
can and I'm in a transition was covering like labor and Uber and
00:19:45
now what Google and YouTube. I mean, usually YouTube.
00:19:48
Yeah, I mean YouTube is part of Google.
00:19:50
But yeah, Google with an I just learned that with alphabet or
00:19:53
just, just Google. I think it's Google with a focus
00:19:56
on YouTube but it's Owing to be Google corporate Politics as
00:19:59
well. But yeah, I mean basically
00:20:02
Tick-Tock and its user and it's you know ux has completely
00:20:07
upended. All social media companies.
00:20:09
It's the only thing. Everyone's scrambling to copy
00:20:12
that even YouTube. Which you would think.
00:20:13
Is this like unmovable unchangeable bhima that I saw
00:20:17
there was like a Pew study that says 95 percent of teens are
00:20:21
using YouTube. So like dwarfing every other
00:20:24
platform you know, YouTube remains right on Have Mark
00:20:28
Bergen hon of Bloomberg. Who has a book coming out?
00:20:30
Yes it's a like comment subscribe.
00:20:33
I believe we are hotly anticipated by the dead cat
00:20:36
show. Yeah.
00:20:38
Now what will go deep on YouTube when Bergen is on but but yeah
00:20:41
so I had to download Tick-Tock and you know, they ask me
00:20:45
generally, you know, because you when you first he's been too
00:20:47
long for you but you don't remember.
00:20:49
But can you first go on? They ask you like generally,
00:20:50
what are you into? So I can just populate the feed
00:20:53
with something and then I guess over time they like refine it to
00:20:57
make it. Even more addictive.
00:20:58
And at first, the stuff that they kept showing me was like
00:21:02
prank videos, but it would be like, but it was like
00:21:06
life-affirming prank videos. So it would be like a guy going
00:21:10
up to someone at an inn and out and being like, Hey, man, can I
00:21:12
have three dollars to buy a burger and then if he gives
00:21:15
them, you know, like five dollars right here?
00:21:17
Like, it'll be like, it'll be like, hey, how much was your
00:21:22
meal for your you and your friend?
00:21:23
And he's like, oh man, it's like $18 is like, here's 20 bucks a
00:21:26
nice guy. - where is your beasts guy famous, just like, instead
00:21:31
of using the money that he would use on marketing using the money
00:21:35
to just like, give to people and using that to generate interest,
00:21:38
right? If he's like the most popular
00:21:40
Creator on YouTube, so he has a large budget where the guys were
00:21:43
just like at stake talk. So I can spend $20 or something
00:21:46
on this, but I've been getting a lot of those at first.
00:21:49
I think that just there's a universal human.
00:21:51
I get the, these Tick-Tock guys go up to somebody.
00:21:54
It's like, do you want $2 or do you want me to do?
00:21:57
Owen give $4 to the next person. I've seen that one.
00:21:59
Yeah. They like a costume.
00:22:01
People at the mall. I don't like those and then I've
00:22:03
got a lot of like soldiers surprising their family by
00:22:05
coming home V. Basically, I'm getting like
00:22:07
Midwestern Christian, mom Tick-Tock which is very strange
00:22:11
for me. It has moved away from that
00:22:14
eventually, but it was funny to see, like the algorithm being
00:22:17
like, who the hell is this guy now?
00:22:19
It's a lot of DIY projects. You know, people like unyielding
00:22:23
were Tick-Tock. Tick-Tock Tick-Tock Tick-Tock
00:22:25
Tick-Tock but you don't think YouTube YouTube.
00:22:27
There's to me. But my problem with YouTube is
00:22:29
it's just, I feel like it's, it's just really over index is
00:22:33
on whatever you watch. Like it's all like MacBook tips
00:22:37
chess and like video game sort of suggestion stuff, donkey and
00:22:43
particular, do you ever go through and delete your history
00:22:46
to like force the algorithm to re know find you?
00:22:49
That's interesting. Oh I do that all the time.
00:22:51
I just get annoyed because what happens is I'll do it and it
00:22:54
keeps eventually getting back to the right thing for Me which is
00:22:57
like old David Letterman Clips or something or like nor
00:23:01
McDonald over and over again? I don't know if you can do that
00:23:04
with Tick-Tock though like force the algorithm to forget.
00:23:06
You like redefine who you are. But what I've noticed with
00:23:10
Tick-Tock and I think probably is part of the reason it's so
00:23:13
addictive. Is it does change itself up a
00:23:16
little bit? Oh yeah, I think in different
00:23:18
sessions on be like, oh, forget forget all that shit about like,
00:23:21
whatever workout videos, like let's move to, you know, like
00:23:25
leather building things out of It seems like Tick Tock could
00:23:29
figure out very quickly, though, the diet's over.
00:23:31
Now we're fantasizing. I like pizza.
00:23:33
You know, I like it is very responsive to whatever that that
00:23:37
shift is. Yeah.
00:23:39
Well, I when Katie's on next to, I'll have to ask her about
00:23:42
because she said, she got a lot of cooking Tick-Tock videos.
00:23:44
Like she would get a lot of people making shit on there and
00:23:48
all the food videos on Tick, Tock are gross to me.
00:23:51
It's just like people rapping spaghetti and like, burger meat
00:23:55
and I mean, it's been written about.
00:23:56
But, you know, Oh, there are these accounts where the gimmick
00:24:00
is, they just make the food terribly in a sort of
00:24:03
unappealing way and like, it's a total engagement hack just to
00:24:08
get people to like, be like, why are you doing this?
00:24:11
And, you know, it's just it's like we're doing it because you
00:24:14
flip out and like, people hate it and that's that is what's
00:24:17
disturbing about social media where it's just I feel like some
00:24:21
human should come in and be like this.
00:24:23
This isn't good for anybody. Like this is just objective.
00:24:27
Bad. Anyone who would like to spend
00:24:29
their time. Like, if they would just stop
00:24:32
watching these, if somebody could be like, you know, this is
00:24:34
like bullshit, right? It's just meant to make you
00:24:36
angry. Like, I don't know, that's where
00:24:39
social media gets. So black, especially strange,
00:24:41
with cooking stuff, because it could be useful, right?
00:24:43
Like, it could be like a cooking tip.
00:24:46
You could apply, start off, may be reasonable and then they
00:24:48
doing something. They just, it's hard to tell
00:24:51
which it is though. Like I saw one the other day
00:24:53
where someone had like taken like a rib eye steak and put it
00:24:56
inside a Watermelon. And then put the watermelon on
00:25:00
the grill, to see, I'm sure this is just gonna drive you and say,
00:25:04
well, he was just like, Bool during like, I hate you.
00:25:06
That's like, exactly wasn't gross or anything.
00:25:09
It was just like, what the fuck is this?
00:25:10
Like, yeah, I guess you could do that but it's been living in my
00:25:14
head since then. So I guess like it was effective
00:25:16
as far as that goes, right? It's a strange app.
00:25:19
It's and I guess the thing I want to ask you because you and
00:25:22
Katie are addicted to it. Do you feel fulfilled after you
00:25:26
watch a lot of sex, You feel like oh, I've just gotten some
00:25:28
solid entertainment here, I do find it a very, it's a very
00:25:33
enjoyable, you know, I do think it delivers like dopamine hits
00:25:37
pretty regularly. I also, it does surface like,
00:25:41
you know, philosophy tick-tocks and stuff.
00:25:44
So sometimes I I find myself like quoting back various like
00:25:48
aphorisms and like summations of different thinkers and how did
00:25:53
you get to them in? A lot of a seed, has a core,
00:25:55
whatever. Dziedzic like this, Jack David?
00:25:58
Yeah, yeah. Okay, that's good.
00:26:00
He's entry like him on. They're doing it or people just
00:26:02
quoting him, both him, him doing it, and then people sort of
00:26:06
interpret it. Okay, well, that's been on
00:26:09
YouTube to, I know, like Contra points was like, a very popular
00:26:12
YouTube account of, like, the kind of a leftist trans, right?
00:26:15
And I'll get all these philosophers traps, you know,
00:26:19
apparently there's no Bridge content on Tick-Tock because it
00:26:22
hasn't found me. Well, that could be you gah,
00:26:26
there's an audience for that. Sure, well they don't have
00:26:28
Tick-Tock. I mean it's like if the mail it
00:26:31
to their house, I guess the reason I asked though is that
00:26:34
every like Tick-Tock session that I've had which yet like
00:26:37
it's rising like I said yesterday I was on it for like
00:26:39
one point two hours which is disgusting.
00:26:42
I don't feel good afterwards. I think I just feel like it's
00:26:45
pure empty calories and it's not like, you know, Facebook or
00:26:48
Instagram or YouTube or like full nourishment, but there's a
00:26:51
unique emptiness from my Tick Tock experiences that.
00:26:54
I'm just like the bare minimum of entertainment To me that I
00:26:59
turn it off at some point because I'm just like, you know,
00:27:02
like I feel like a glutton and I'm just, like, full of bad food
00:27:07
that I gorged on. It's always funny when you get a
00:27:09
tick tock this like, basically, trying to convince you, they
00:27:12
Tick Tock. He's like terrible or like there
00:27:14
was some like passage from like my Dinner with Andre or
00:27:18
something. That's at the time that movie
00:27:22
comes out very cynical of sort of, our consumptive world.
00:27:27
Sort of information consumptive world and like imagine that sort
00:27:32
of in the context of tick-tock I do.
00:27:34
It's yeah. But I'm like oh my God I got
00:27:37
like an interesting you know I was just like it's good at like
00:27:41
giving you a lot of like what's going on in the world.
00:27:43
Like I don't know more satisfying than Twitter at all.
00:27:46
When you say going on in the world, do you mean like what are
00:27:48
the things that people are into on Tick-Tock?
00:27:50
Right? Right.
00:27:50
Well, that yeah. What are the trends?
00:27:52
Yeah, you're way more in touch with your fellow humans from
00:27:55
that. I feel like well yeah.
00:27:57
Yes. Certainly, I mean, it's
00:27:58
obviously not your friends and maybe more than Twitter because
00:28:01
that does optimizes towards journalists and making you
00:28:04
angry, which Tick-Tock doesn't really.
00:28:06
It seems like. I like the app couldn't be
00:28:07
successful. If it's just about making you
00:28:09
mad in the way. No does.
00:28:10
Yeah. We'll see what happens as time
00:28:13
goes on. But at the current moment, I'm
00:28:16
at with it, it's just like, I guess I just the bare minimum of
00:28:19
entertainment for me, but because the interaction with it
00:28:23
is so addictive. It's just the swipe and you can
00:28:25
do it so many times that if Doesn't meet that blow low bar,
00:28:29
you can move on to the next one like that and of itself is as
00:28:33
much a part of the experience that like the content.
00:28:35
It's definitely bad for your brain.
00:28:37
You know what has to be? It has so bad.
00:28:39
Yeah, I definitely feel bad after I've been on it in a way
00:28:42
that I did not with with social, you know, other social media
00:28:45
platforms. Anyway, did you want to move on
00:28:47
to be Lon at all Ilan? Which part of it?
00:28:51
Well, that was another thing that happened while I was out
00:28:53
that he is apparently sold like several billion dollars.
00:28:57
Hours worth of his stock in anticipation of losing his, what
00:29:02
his conscience. He said he wasn't selling, then
00:29:04
he sells, you know it's just I don't know is his followers or
00:29:09
the ultimate suckers, you know. I don't know what to say beyond
00:29:12
that it's hysterical. I really have no ambiguity.
00:29:16
Like, I don't know how I mean, it's amazing.
00:29:20
I mean that it seems like this whole Twitter thing existed as a
00:29:24
pretext to let him sell at like the For a Time, definitely, but
00:29:28
he's already lost that Gambit, right?
00:29:30
Because the stock is down so much from when he initially.
00:29:33
But then in the off, rebound it for a while.
00:29:35
I mean it's a has it. Yeah.
00:29:37
Okay. But it's still down
00:29:38
significantly from its peak it's down but it surged.
00:29:42
Yeah. Well but here's my question for
00:29:44
the the Elan you know fanatic sick offense is that I got to
00:29:48
think part of the appeal with him is that he keeps wriggling
00:29:51
out of shit because that is remarkable, right?
00:29:53
It's like he can call someone a pedophile for no reason.
00:29:57
Get sued for it and win or he can claim.
00:30:00
He's going to take Tesla private, the SEC filed a suit
00:30:03
against him, and the nothing really happens.
00:30:05
Other than a slap on the wrists, and that's cool.
00:30:07
Like, I get that, I get that, like, in the age of trump and
00:30:10
like, no, you no consequences for people being outlandish,
00:30:13
like, Elon is one of the best at it.
00:30:15
Consequences are coming. This is we're finally getting
00:30:18
their Trump, they're searching his house Ilan.
00:30:20
They're going to make him buy Twitter, like maybe like
00:30:23
Twitter. Like, that's the ultimate
00:30:25
consequence. It just takes a couple years of
00:30:27
a Craddock Administration and the the party that's you know
00:30:31
allegedly rioting in the streets, brings back Law and
00:30:34
Order. I like that would be you know,
00:30:36
another Vindication for the Democrats.
00:30:38
But yeah. I mean I can't make that
00:30:40
argument. You could make that argument.
00:30:42
I am making that. That is a sincere argument.
00:30:44
Yeah. Yeah.
00:30:45
Is that, like, look, if we like a year from now, Elon is like
00:30:49
owning Twitter and just tanking it and drop.
00:30:52
I do love. I do love the D.
00:30:53
We I mean the conservatives love to go crazy.
00:30:56
It's like the Crap. Don't even want him to have
00:30:59
Twitter, but now they desperately want to force him to
00:31:03
have Twitter but I'm like, that's a totally coherent, like
00:31:06
logical story. Like I can that makes total
00:31:09
sense to me that I would prefer to punish Ilan for following
00:31:14
through on his agreement. Then saved Twitter to be like I
00:31:18
mean just burn it down, you know.
00:31:20
Yeah. I mean there's not even like a
00:31:21
politicization yet really with like, by owning Twitter, like
00:31:25
it's just like he signed a fucking Tracked that says he
00:31:28
needs to own it but it is funny to see, politicians.
00:31:31
You know, they were trying to like Curry favor with Ilan.
00:31:34
They're like, oh, he's a, he's a free agent right now.
00:31:36
Like we could draft him. We know he basically said he's
00:31:39
going to support DeSantis. Yeah.
00:31:41
Oh, did he go? Because I know we said he
00:31:42
wouldn't support Trump. He is signaled to Santa support,
00:31:47
but I'm talking more about like, the, you know, attorney general
00:31:50
in Texas, filing a suit against twittering because of, you know,
00:31:54
unjust not disclosing their but levels, you know, To me was like
00:31:57
a clear, like, oh, we can show him that like, we can, you know,
00:32:00
like, the the Texas legal system is on his side.
00:32:04
Yeah. Join us.
00:32:06
How are people not disturbed by this?
00:32:08
Yeah, exactly. Right.
00:32:09
So, that was like, a clear move in that direction.
00:32:11
But then I'm saying, so, like, a year from now, Elon is owning
00:32:13
Twitter. And Trump is like, in prison for
00:32:17
Espionage. Well, you probably just be on
00:32:19
trial or something. Yeah.
00:32:21
Okay. But like, he's actually charged
00:32:22
in a serious way and like, I mean, it wouldn't be a bad move
00:32:26
by democrats, to claim like this.
00:32:27
Is the system functioning again at rice is, what happens?
00:32:31
Normally, you know, when we go out first couple crypto frauds,
00:32:34
you know, I mean, they're, they're investigating like
00:32:36
coinbase. I mean, it is insane.
00:32:39
How slow it all is. And the functionaries have been
00:32:42
there the whole time. But the crypto thing is weird
00:32:45
though, right? Like it doesn't seem like either
00:32:48
party is trying to make like being for or against it.
00:32:51
A core aspect of their platform right now, right now I'm worried
00:32:55
that people are going to get bought out by But I mean there's
00:32:58
you know Sam bingman freed is donating a ton of money and they
00:33:03
all want it to be regulated by the Commodities future trading
00:33:08
commission instead of the SEC, which is just like Bonkers.
00:33:12
I mean, it's just like, so it won't fall under all the SEC
00:33:16
rules because we're going to treat it as something totally
00:33:19
different. I mean, it's it's like an insane
00:33:21
work around, but I do worry that it's the classic case where
00:33:25
there were the people who support.
00:33:27
Thing are such diehards that there isn't the same energy on
00:33:31
the opposite. Like what am I going to spend my
00:33:33
life arguing that Bitcoin can't be, you know, regulate it should
00:33:37
be regulated by the SEC. What is the politicians getting
00:33:39
bought out by the crypto world? Look like them?
00:33:42
It's just donors. There's like a bill.
00:33:43
There's a bill. I forget.
00:33:46
It's like, it's weird. It's like the agriculture
00:33:48
chairs. I forget but there's a key Bill.
00:33:51
Its, that's been position. That's very Pro crypto.
00:33:55
Uh-huh. So basically just the Passage of
00:33:57
that bill if that if that's somehow gonna be a boondoggle,
00:34:00
be insane. Yeah, yeah.
00:34:02
I'm because we've already passed the point of like, you know, the
00:34:05
individual coins. You know, like suddenly
00:34:07
Elizabeth Warren's, like I'm doing a warrant coin or a very
00:34:10
coin and like, you know that she's been bought out or
00:34:14
something like that. Period has passed already to be
00:34:16
clear. Elizabeth Warren has in no way
00:34:19
done that and no, no. But I'm saying that would be the
00:34:21
ultimate like that would be the shirt victory for crypto is
00:34:23
that? Yeah, he is.
00:34:25
That would be quite the Bailey. Coin Ico would be the end of any
00:34:29
sort of like, you know, Federal Regulation of u.s. space.
00:34:32
Anything. Always with Warren is extremely
00:34:34
hostile to that. Yeah.
00:34:36
But that period has passed. So, yeah, I guess it would have
00:34:38
to be legislation, which is very hard to do like that.
00:34:42
You know. No one can pass any legislation.
00:34:44
Now, whoa, we've had tons but yeah, sure.
00:34:48
Yeah, sure. I mean, it everything currents
00:34:50
like a Herculean effort and not sort of like oh yeah.
00:34:54
We'll just try something and we can always pass the different
00:34:56
bill or Whatever. Yeah, the dates Cinema would be
00:34:59
pretty easy to take. I feel like, you know, given
00:35:02
that she came out in favor of the carried interest loophole,
00:35:06
which is still one of the craziest things for someone to
00:35:08
like later career alive for newcomer is proudly in favor of
00:35:14
carried interest exemption kill. I'm Brian not in favor but
00:35:18
definitely I think my financial interest would seem to be in
00:35:21
favor you know like I feel like I should have had a subscription
00:35:25
drive when that got repealed. Be like oh you thought you were
00:35:28
going to lose like millions of dollars a year?
00:35:31
Because of this you can spend $150 on media like yeah.
00:35:35
But it's the opposite of a special offer it was just like I
00:35:38
just found out that your net worths are going to be protected
00:35:41
exactly for the foreseeable future.
00:35:43
Subscribe, your passive income is fucking guaranteed during
00:35:47
jacking up the price. You should have done that Frank.
00:35:49
Yeah. Was there a Sam bacon?
00:35:52
Free tweet storm. Yeah, to between threads so it's
00:35:54
fascinating. Yeah, I'm just trying Sighing.
00:35:58
Okay, he tweeted this on Sunday, the financial circle jerk, then
00:36:03
it makes it clear. This is not Financial advice and
00:36:06
missing lots of nuance. He says, in the last year, meta,
00:36:10
has around 100 billion dollars in Revenue, that it makes him
00:36:13
selling ads. And it's like who buys Those
00:36:16
ads. Uber, Sofia firm, Robin Hood,
00:36:19
coinbase Jordache. I mean, it's basically making
00:36:21
this argument that VC, money, you know, flows into Facebook,
00:36:26
that makes Facebook more valuable than then.
00:36:31
I feel like the big leap of this argument, is that, then the
00:36:34
money coming out of Facebook, effectively makes the VCS richer
00:36:38
allowing them to invest in startups again.
00:36:41
So, this is a very 2014 fighting arguing, we use.
00:36:45
Be obsessed with this because there are app install ads,
00:36:47
right? And so the idea was by startups
00:36:50
that were all VC funded. And so it was just indirect VC
00:36:52
money flowing into Facebook, but then it basically then all the
00:36:55
Brand's figured out. I mean, the death of like, what
00:36:58
someone called, I don't know, Casper and stuff, Warby Parker.
00:37:02
I mean those companies, they're both are still our own death,
00:37:04
they're still around but like that they're not like huge sexy
00:37:07
companies anymore is because yeah, other e-commerce other
00:37:10
brands figured out how to advertise on Facebook and so the
00:37:14
ads As weren't underpriced anymore.
00:37:16
You know, basically startups just didn't have exclusive
00:37:19
access to Facebook ad. So this is feels like an
00:37:21
extremely dated. Yeah, argument.
00:37:24
Yeah. It's like he's just catching up
00:37:26
on the thing that like you said, we were freaking out about in
00:37:29
2014 15 when Facebook, you know, was basically a lever that push
00:37:34
people towards different mobile apps by targeting people in
00:37:37
their timeline. And yeah, it did not take down
00:37:40
Facebook even though a ton of those direct to Consumer
00:37:43
companies did collapse because Is they have a huge fucking base
00:37:46
of advertisers, like it's just, it's just more complicated than
00:37:50
that. They have like small businesses
00:37:52
all over the world advertising on their they have like
00:37:54
multibillion-dollar even like when there was like the ad
00:37:56
boycott against Facebook at the height of like Cambridge
00:37:59
analytical and like a ton of big Brands pulled their advertising
00:38:02
for a month from them. It didn't affect their earnings
00:38:05
at all. So anyone who's like arguing
00:38:07
that they're like you know, Sterling Cooper and their entire
00:38:11
Revenue stream is based on Lucky Strike that's just not true.
00:38:15
Or Facebook. So I would not that's pretty
00:38:17
disappointing from the boy Genius of the crypto world.
00:38:21
And somebody was just like I ever I mean I think this was a
00:38:24
common reaction on Twitter but just like I'm not the posi your
00:38:29
the Ponzi, you know, it just felt like an extreme sort of
00:38:32
deflection from you know, a business that is often accused
00:38:36
of like Facebook people were saying that no, no, I'm saying
00:38:39
that like crypto world like this and Bank Note, 3 ft x world
00:38:42
right is dependent, you know, a deeply Actor world where the
00:38:46
value of one thing props up, you know, they all crash together.
00:38:49
You know, it's not like these, it's not like we had a Bitcoin
00:38:51
crash, and aetherium crash to, you know, they're all they're
00:38:55
very correlated right now. So that there is death.
00:38:58
There is Ponzi economics all over over crypto world.
00:39:03
So then it does feel a little bit like absurd to make it seem
00:39:07
like it's a Facebook issue. Well, the mistake he made was
00:39:11
focusing on Facebook I think like they're just too big of a
00:39:15
Any, if you did it for SNAP, for example, that could feel a
00:39:19
little bit more true, right? And like their you know their
00:39:21
business did kind of collapse during a quarter because there
00:39:25
was a downturn in like a specific type of Advertiser, let
00:39:29
that like those ones like app install ads.
00:39:31
And so I mean it's not a sexy argument to make like you're not
00:39:33
going to go viral by saying, like Snap is not a very safe
00:39:36
company because too much of their at, you know, Revenue
00:39:38
comes from app install ads from precarious startups, but they
00:39:42
going after Facebook was just, that was dumb like that.
00:39:45
I don't know, to tell you dude, on some level, I'm sympathetic
00:39:48
to what he's trying to say. People clearly underestimate how
00:39:52
interconnected everything is and valuations, are I mean, that's
00:39:55
why, when the bear Market comes, It Feels So sudden everything
00:40:00
evaporates it once because it's like, you know, your Revenue,
00:40:04
you know, was my investment doll for this from you know, my
00:40:07
investment dollars, your evaluation was propping up
00:40:10
startup valuations, you know, there is a level of
00:40:14
interconnected. Dennis to it.
00:40:15
All in Facebook is one of the most, you know, the largest
00:40:18
companies in the world and is sort of essential to part of the
00:40:22
ecosystem, but feels super misguided in that Facebook.
00:40:27
I mean, and one last thing that Sam doesn't ring up is of
00:40:31
course, Zuckerberg is a huge investor and iconic and other
00:40:35
firms, probably and those firms than prop up the startup world,
00:40:38
but I just don't agree with this.
00:40:40
Like, the VC funds are just like getting their money.
00:40:42
First of all, he, I think he said that face.
00:40:45
It was paying off dividends and that shareholders which is not
00:40:48
true. Right?
00:40:48
That's not true. So it's like Facebook's increase
00:40:51
in value made, you know, Vanguard wealthy and then
00:40:55
Vanguard cells some of that and is like an LP or like more
00:40:59
accurately, like the Harvard endowment.
00:41:01
So some sure is and becomes an LP.
00:41:03
I mean, there's a, there's a truth to it but it just like, I
00:41:05
don't know. I mean, just moving from, it's
00:41:09
like a claim about how much you Zuma, but I don't know.
00:41:12
Is the world bigger is the world small?
00:41:14
It's like you can see See it both ways and we all cycle
00:41:16
through like saying the world is very small in the world is huge,
00:41:20
you know, right? Yeah but I guess what I don't
00:41:23
would it seems like we're all kind of waiting around for to a
00:41:25
degree is like we know that there is going to be some sort
00:41:29
of downturn Tesla to implode. That's right.
00:41:32
That's right. That's the thing we want to
00:41:34
collapse, you want to Lehman Brothers and when I say want, I
00:41:36
don't mean the media will say just mean like that's a clear
00:41:38
signal. You feel like if you have a
00:41:39
bubble, you have. I mean SoftBank is down a lot
00:41:42
and there's a lot more markdown, so soft.
00:41:45
Is looking. I mean, again these things are
00:41:47
never like a total total shock. I mean, on the one hand, like
00:41:51
Enron was one of the most, you know, popular companies
00:41:54
wherever. But my sense is that people were
00:41:56
also like deeply skeptical of it at the time.
00:41:59
Sure. I mean, they were aware that it
00:42:01
was responsible for many bad things.
00:42:02
The idea of like energy trading was not a sustainable business
00:42:06
in the way that they were doing it.
00:42:07
Like let alone like like forgetting the fraud and and all
00:42:10
that aspect. But you know, like Lehman
00:42:12
Brothers like people were looking For a load-bearing beam
00:42:16
in the economy to collapse to bring down a whole bunch of
00:42:19
things and it's I just don't know what it would be here.
00:42:23
We talked about this before, on the show like we had success
00:42:26
with it. Yeah.
00:42:27
Like it's just it's I mean, Robin Hood is not load-bearing.
00:42:30
But I mean we have yet to see the sort of dramatic
00:42:33
bankruptcies. I mean you know, emile's company
00:42:37
d-wave just listed through ass pack and the fact that I mean
00:42:41
these Quantum companies which even if the technology is As
00:42:45
good as advertised have just such a long time Horizon, right?
00:42:49
You know, I just feel like we're still seeing sort of, you know,
00:42:53
optimistic forward-looking stuff.
00:42:57
And that's why I'm saying I right now we're in this what I
00:42:59
believe to be sort of a temporary up turns out at CERN.
00:43:04
It's making everybody sort of feel good about the.
00:43:07
I mean, literally true moth. I've been listening to all in a
00:43:09
lot. I'm thinking about writing a
00:43:11
piece about them and like, Josh, your mouth was basically like,
00:43:15
You know, take a Victory lap, he's a stock market, you know?
00:43:17
Because his stuff is up, like 20% or so, you know, it's like
00:43:20
so like this last six months, I mean, like he's he must be down
00:43:24
unbelievably from the SPAC Peak that he had right.
00:43:27
Like there's no there is nothing for him to Champion until he's
00:43:30
like up again from, you know, from the beginning of the wave
00:43:34
that he created with specs. I mean that would be an
00:43:36
interesting thing. But again, like the SEC
00:43:38
basically killed specs, so it never got to a point where it
00:43:41
could be such a large part of the market that, you know, it
00:43:46
You know, like the bad fundamentals of all those
00:43:48
businesses could be like, you know, have larger Ripple
00:43:50
effects. I don't know, I don't know.
00:43:53
I mean it's very strange to cover because of that.
00:43:55
Right? Like you want to write the
00:43:56
Lord's Trend piece to explain the State of Affairs, it just
00:44:00
seems like it's mostly just a valuation reset, right.
00:44:02
Just a lot of companies that were growth, right?
00:44:04
That's makes clear and I mean that's where it's been super
00:44:07
interesting because you saw like well I mean that, you know, it
00:44:11
companies had fallen a lot and then they rebound a lot.
00:44:13
I mean, it's all you see a lot of Arresting price Discovery
00:44:17
happening which you know, makes the market more fun.
00:44:19
Yeah. And like when the supply chain
00:44:21
is like at the center of a lot of the problems and it's such a
00:44:24
complicated right? You know ASP races were in say
00:44:26
now they're low, you know, we had all this coverage about gas
00:44:30
prices and now it's like they're low again.
00:44:32
I mean other still high, but they're not as high.
00:44:34
They're prettier way down and they are down.
00:44:37
I'm still paying more than five dollars a gallon.
00:44:39
Yeah, you live in California, I mean, I'm saying you're crazy a
00:44:41
lot, but I used to think people who live in California, New
00:44:44
York. Yeah, being shocked about gas
00:44:47
prices. I mean, to be clear, we should
00:44:49
have gas taxes like high, gas prices make sense.
00:44:53
Yeah, that's, that's, that's a difficult argument.
00:44:55
I saw people out there making it basically.
00:44:57
We, I'm like saying the higher than Tracy, that forces people
00:45:01
to not use their yes. And it's like, yeah, the market
00:45:04
is supposed to word. It's a regressive, it's a
00:45:06
regressive tax, most of the time like it's like taxing
00:45:09
cigarettes. Ultimately like the people that
00:45:11
don't have money, still have to use cars, and if you raise gas
00:45:15
prices, They're not going to suddenly be able to do their
00:45:16
jobs by taking public transit. Which by the way, rich people
00:45:19
don't do. And like, if this was done
00:45:21
hand-in-hand from like making public transit functional and
00:45:24
like something that people all over cities and like Suburban
00:45:27
areas could use then I could like begin to hear that
00:45:30
argument. But I would think your crew you
00:45:32
know the the sort of Market based thinking would be you're
00:45:35
creating more support for public transit.
00:45:39
If people feel squeezed by taking their cars and pandering
00:45:43
to people and the poorest People obviously don't have cars so
00:45:47
we're talking it is a middle-class shoe and then there
00:45:52
is like, people can still have cars, you know, there are, there
00:45:55
are in there are sort of Middle Ground Solutions, Beyond just,
00:46:00
you know, not going anywhere. You can drive less.
00:46:03
I would actually be in favor of having a guest on here to talk
00:46:06
through some of this stuff. Because I do think it's
00:46:07
interesting. I always thought like the
00:46:09
transit aspect of the gig economy was the most interesting
00:46:13
part of the be that I probably should have written more about.
00:46:15
Bout. You did some of the gas stories?
00:46:17
Yeah, I did the gas stories. And I also wrote a bit about
00:46:19
companies that were trying to use because like, uber pool as
00:46:22
you like to say, was a failure. Yes.
00:46:24
And but they like, the idea of it is obviously a good one,
00:46:27
which is like, how do we create efficiencies in car sharing?
00:46:31
Which it's obviously not. That is not happened.
00:46:33
We've just like clogged cities with gig workers who were just
00:46:37
trying to pick up fares and like made traffic worse.
00:46:40
So, Uber pool was supposed to be solution to that, but it didn't
00:46:42
work for a meal, you know, a million reasons.
00:46:44
But the technology Behind it. If it were actually perfected,
00:46:48
could be good, right? Like, you could have a sort of
00:46:50
like smart routing public transit system that is like
00:46:53
equivalent to an Uber pool, but actually makes economic sense
00:46:56
because you're using larger vehicles.
00:46:58
I find all that stuff really interesting and it's an area
00:47:01
that Uber has absolutely failed in, but there are some startups
00:47:03
that are trying to do it. I don't know.
00:47:05
I'm so skeptical that anyone who says they can try and do, I just
00:47:10
feel like uber We talked about this company way too much, but,
00:47:15
Uber through, what what's the number now?
00:47:17
Like, 30 plus billion dollars at these problems, like, if we
00:47:21
haven't experimented enough on what's possible with routing,
00:47:25
what's possible with carbon like they've failed, you know, there
00:47:29
was a huge subsidy to make this possible, right, and they
00:47:32
couldn't make it work, consumers weren't willing to pay for it.
00:47:35
So I don't think some small piddly startup is just going to
00:47:39
like, I mean, this happens obviously, you know, in
00:47:41
comments. Get sloppy.
00:47:42
But I just feel like we just went through a period of massive
00:47:46
research in this and I just don't think it works.
00:47:49
I think it makes much more sense to just like improve the bus
00:47:53
system. You know, like the buses Newark.
00:47:55
I mean, the bus just doesn't come like you go and wait for
00:47:59
it. Like I don't know why it doesn't
00:48:00
count but like I really like just my just some tweaks to the
00:48:04
municipal bus services in the biggest cities in the world
00:48:07
seems more valuable than like, I don't know.
00:48:10
Even though I tend to believe in Solving these things on on
00:48:14
busing them, pretty, right? This is quite a change from from
00:48:17
last week. When you were saying that you
00:48:18
thought Amazon could could fix our Health Care system, because
00:48:21
they're a great company. Well, part of the problem is
00:48:24
that a company would be competing against a subsidized
00:48:28
service. So if you were to take this
00:48:30
subsidy that we use for buses and handed over to a company or
00:48:34
sort of competing companies, maybe I would be bullish on
00:48:39
that. Meanwhile, Amazon is moving into
00:48:41
competing against like Like doctors offices, right?
00:48:45
Other companies? Sure, sure.
00:48:47
Yeah. It's a different art I'm saying.
00:48:48
Don't compete against a subsidized service that seems
00:48:52
like a loser. I don't think it's hard to be so
00:48:56
much more efficient that you can be do something.
00:48:58
So, I mean, what these startups man, we really should bring
00:49:01
someone on if you're interested in this because there are a lot
00:49:03
out there and they are smart people that their argument is
00:49:06
basically just trying to win contracts with public transit.
00:49:08
So it's like we have great routing technology, we can input
00:49:12
that In your buses and make them kind of be like ride hail
00:49:16
adjacent, you know, like uber pools but with larger vehicles
00:49:19
and it wouldn't be like some company doing it.
00:49:21
They would be providing the technology that undergirds it
00:49:23
and maybe the app or something not not much money, maybe maybe
00:49:27
do it again, I got some it not, it's not a great.
00:49:29
If I mean, these companies have been pitching me for my like
00:49:31
four years, I just sort of avoid them at all.
00:49:34
I mean, none of them have well, these down to, it's really hard.
00:49:37
I mean, like these basically say for most companies, if your
00:49:40
client is the government. We're not all that interested
00:49:43
unless it's the government trying to kill people and then
00:49:46
there's a lot of door and that if sure if you want to help the
00:49:49
government do what it does. Best the course of a honest of
00:49:52
the state, exactly what we were once great at and Erica killing
00:49:57
people. It's Kia, the military
00:49:59
industrial complex was like a great opportunity.
00:50:01
Yeah. I mean that people these are
00:50:03
extremely bullish on enderal. I do think people really look to
00:50:07
that as a model and so I think there's going to be a lot of
00:50:10
investing in that space. I mean And recent obviously as
00:50:13
American dynamism. So it's red hot.
00:50:17
Yeah. Cal is starting to throw like
00:50:19
clothes off my bed so we probably have to wrap it up
00:50:22
there. Soon was there anything else you
00:50:24
want to talk about? We didn't really get into the
00:50:26
Trump FBI's. Well without Katie I feel like
00:50:29
it's yeah we can we can put a pin in that.
00:50:32
I have so many questions so many questions.
00:50:36
I feel like we've just moved fully into the Burn After
00:50:38
Reading version of reality. Anyway, this was good.
00:50:42
I'm I'm glad to be back. Yeah.
00:50:43
I mean I'm glad to take a vacation but I had I had a lot
00:50:46
of thoughts that I had no Outlet, no Forum to put them in
00:50:51
so I guess if nothing else. That's what this podcast is for.
00:50:54
I can't even promise. What will happen next week?
00:50:55
We've previewed a couple of guests coming up soon.
00:50:57
We'll have Mark Bergen on. Oh yeah.
00:50:59
About YouTube, we have a few other ideas.
00:51:02
We've been. We've been working on, so stay
00:51:05
tuned. Thanks for listening and we'll
00:51:07
see everyone back here next week.
00:51:11
Goodbye. Goodbye, goodbye.
00:51:23
Goodbye, goodbye, goodbye, goodbye.
00:51:25
Goodbye.