Gadgetory

welcome to the 359 I'm Roger Jane I'm Joanie Saltzman yesterday Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg dropped a big update about how the social network is combating political meddling John were the details so soccer Brooks said that Facebook would be taking down more than two hundred and seventy pages and accounts run by the internet research agency or IRA if you're wondering you know why didn't Facebook already do this and that's because it had but up until this point most of Facebook's take downs had been designed to prevent the IRA from interfering interfering in foreign elections this time Facebook is taking down the IRAs pages and fake accounts and all accounts that are targeting people living in Russia itself ah so I mean is this is this enough or this too little too late for Facebook well I think one thing that it definitely shows especially in the way that Facebook announced this move is how much more transparent they're willing to be about what they're actually doing you know they gave examples of some of the pages that they were taking about taking down in the past when they've made moves like this it would take a long time even for them just to say what it was that they were taking down right well they kind of have to be a little bit more transparent now given the hot water in from the whole Cambridge analytic Adana flap right now we've got confirmation that Zuckerberg will be appearing before Congress to testify and next week you know obviously this comes after mounting pressure from from that controversy just curious what your uh would you expect any here if this is gonna be you know if this is just gonna be a sideshow well I mean whenever somebody goes to testify in front of lawmakers it becomes a lot of theater I mean there's a lot of theater involved no matter what but as you know correct me if I'm wrong but I think Zuckerberg has never testified ever that is correct he's really good at sending his lieutenants right and so you know it speaks to the fact that he's that Facebook is starting to realize that you know the buck stops there and he needs to be the one you know he said in the past like I'd be happy to testify in front of Congress if I'm the right person to do it and I think the response that a lot of people had was is you're always the best person to do it at least you should be alright so the big story from yesterday was a shooting at YouTube's headquarter a police confirmed the shooter was Nasim Mojave automat 39 year old woman who had various YouTube channels and complained that YouTube is no longer paying for content now Joan could you help me break down with the monetization policy and why someone would you know I have a grievance against YouTube right so generally speaking monetization complaints by youtubers are centered around the fact that they believe that their content should be allowed to have advertising run on it and therefore making them money sure especially in the last year and a half YouTube has had a lot of difficulty because it's trying to straddle satisfying two different contingents its youtubers the ones that upload stuff and its advertisers who want safety and what their ads are run against YouTube's had a really difficult time figuring out the happy medium where it is putting ads against stuff that's safe for advertisers but not censoring quote-unquote the youtubers that are uploading content by D monetizing them so that's essentially what the the conflict is about alright so lastly I just show it's not all grim news I wanted to give a shout out to Patrick Holland for his lovely feature on robot companions these soft cuddly contraptions can help people who are dealing with cancer diabetes depression dementia and more and there's even one modeled after the athletic Patrick node that after spending 15 minutes with it he did not want to let go so we wanted to end on a you know a cute and cuddly note alright so for more these stories check us out on CNN I'm Roger check I'm Johnny sauceman thanks for listening okay that concludes a recording of the audio podcast thanks everybody for joining us I'm gonna go ahead and jump back into the chat room and see if I can dig out any good comments and questions and let's talk more about the duck because that's the only thing I want to think about right now Patrick Holland always does such a nice jobs on his story I really enjoy his personality I only got to meet him for the first time this year at CES when we were there he's so much fun where where did he come up with this where did he find this cuz this originates with the parousia correct yeah yep our CEO it was the that serves the I guess that's the name brand companion robot around for a while and he went to this VA hospital and he saw how various patients sort of lit up when they saw pero who's almost like a celebrity like oh there's the there's the seal one the doctor said like especially patients dementia when they're holding the seal they don't know that it's a robot they think it's the legit thing and the doctors are like you know what this helps with the care like we're not gonna break that illusion so these kinds of robots definitely have a real powerful impact on you know for adults for for children particularly in terms of a calming influence and in helping with their recovery and just this stem from his interaction with the athletic scss when he spent time with it and then he he decided to do a bit more research and start digging into some of these other robots that that also comes for the same purpose yeah it's very cool let's take a question from Mike Shaw in the chat how long until apartment start charging an extra deposit for Robo pets that is because you know robot robot pets don't do any of the things that ruin apartments I don't eat and get food everywhere that's true defecate and urinate that's what one of the doctors mentioned like you know it's very hard to bring in a dog or a pet for Hospital this is like you leave it with a patient you know it's not gonna poop anywhere so right you know like in burn units those people it's there's such strict guidelines about bacteria and about yeah yeah Matthew dad sure goes on to point out you know what are we really supposed to be worried about what's a landlord worried about with a robo pet and oil spills I don't know maybe it I don't the worst-case scenario but I've got batteries so it could technically explode only if it was made by Samsung Oh or Boston Dynamics is the worst case like it becomes a Westworld sort of like it because I because like a Chucky overthrows the landlord that oh you're right that is the worst case scenario that is pretty pretty out there but I mean we've all watched Black Mirror we know it could happen very true we've all watched the fictional thing listen how many times against El grito how many times have we cited Terminator on this show right well you brought that up right those those flipping robots I mean one of them that's that's some danger right there I did I just get freaked out with the one that opens doors that's the one that creeps me out the most but whatever it's just this like no no no changing in here strange or he wants us to talk about Russia yeah speaking of Russia can Facebook be considered as a metaphorical nerve gas one that has enchanted society that is an interesting perspective on this diving deep that yeah well I think that you know to go without analogy I think that maybe that has happened and this is like for whatever reason we're in an era right now where people are sort of waking out of that stupor a little bit if you want to call it a stupor I don't know if it's fair or not but you know there definitely was a period of time where tech companies facebook included were cut a lot of slack because as they brought so much convenience to our lives and I think the Facebook itself cut itself slack because it believed in its mission was a good one and so now that the public is realizing and Facebook itself is realizing that even though it had good intentions it can be used for ill and very dramatic and and you know I don't even know if it's necessarily good intentions I think the intention was for Facebook to connect as many people as possible right that mission blinded them to the potential consequences that were there's obviously a very sprung up I don't know if I'd call Facebook itself nerve gas element maybe the if we're gonna use that analogy like the rhetoric around it the misinformation that might be the nerve gas because it's not like Facebook itself is inherently bad right well what about the the Facebook YouTube snapchat generation that's sprung up around it is that is there any redeeming quality to these generations that have been oh yeah someone indoctrinated by the facebook model oh I don't think indoctrination is is what's happened at all to people that were born in the age of these things I think that they just think about the world their worldview is shaped by it I think that younger people are actually more skeptical of Internet companies than people are but is it what would you say that there's like maybe a sweet spot in between the I am you know me like some sort of middle generation that the the older people I don't know I don't know what I'm trying to say here you say the younger people are more skeptical but there's got to be something of a demographic whether it's well maybe it's actually more of a psychographic at this point rather than an age bracket right people who just are more susceptible to I mean once upon a time it would have been films and now it's social media right only playing video games they blame you know right I mean are you the Jen's ears seem to be probably the most skeptical right there right they haven't grown up with this all their lives I think they're they're I guess they're more savvy about it then I think you can older folks who sort see Facebook as a convenience and as a newsfeed yeah for a lot of people well the Jen's ears were a bit more of the screw society kind of screw the man kind of I can't use the language I want to use really kind of was right if you look back in the 90s culture wait wait you Jen's ears are they're the ones ask the Millennials they're really young one they're like the super young ones oh maybe I'm thinking Generation X oh this categorization is this gonna be the new millennial bug worry about all the clocks to reset Josh boy de let's talk more about Facebook will Mark Zuckerberg be testifying a rule it just be for show like all the other testimonies from these companies now we said that he will he's put on buying yeah sure I mean what whether or not he actually says anything or fee the furs I don't know that that'll be interesting how how transparent he'll he'll be cuz there's definitely a lot of pressure on him to give answers and the company has been more transparent yeah as you pointed out earlier I don't know if Zuckerberg is gonna be it's just very interesting because he's not if you see my interviews he's kind of an awkward interview yeah though it'll be interesting how he handles what presumably will be an hour or two hours hours they're gonna have to refresh his firmware before they say welcome back in yeah they're gonna have to reboot I put them in low-power mode mm-hmm yeah I'd be worried that maybe the old outdated scripts might not function up the up the key I'm sure they're they're rewriting the AI algorithms specifically I mean do you have a sense it's my understanding that Mark Zuckerberg has never I mean besides just testifying in Congress that being in first he's never really put himself in a position where he's this vulnerable and no no I mean so we it's hard to know I controlled it's very controlled it's very short usually you know the company's terms but it's definitely an unfavorable terms yeah and the only times he's gone to conferences are like earlier days of all things D conferences right C I think maybe TechCrunch there were a couple where he had like long half-hour segments right he didn't want Sarah Lacy at one point yeah that was 30 minutes long but that was definitely in the early days when Facebook was an up-and-coming company yeah there's a lot of optimism and there's very little skepticism right here's hoping that he doesn't broadcast this one in VR we have a great counterpoint here from snow ponies they say no I think young people are far less skeptical they don't seem to have any concerns about privacy they share everything and that is also true well it might be true for certain Millennials yeah I mean it's we're like over generalizing for sure but what kind of sharing are they engaged and that's the question I want to ask because from a lot of perspective it's a very skeptical very sarcastic very meta kind of perception and and the content that they share they're not actually overly concerned maybe some not more than some are very let's call it self-absorbed well I mean I think let's look at the Parkland students I mean that's a good example of how a Gen Z age bracket like the reason why the discussion about gun control is different for that mass shooting versus other ones is because that's a generation of kids understands how to use social media and to not get caught up in like trolling like they understand how to deal with trolls and they also know how to use social media in a way to advocate for their own personal causes in a way that's kind of a it's a it's unprecedented in gun control discussion in this country yeah I remember snapping like snapchat played a huge presence like in terms of like the heat map for for activity during that protest so for sure that's I mean it's yeah I mean it's like I said it's hard to generalize but that's gen CI with the Millennials I mean I think there is an element where there is over sharing but I think that's also just what I mean like my parents overshare yeah something like when you're that age you're probably doing dumb things to you just now have a much wider platform to do it that's it though I mean we we as people have had a history of over sharing in certain scenarios you always everybody knows that one friend who you get them in the group get a couple drinks in them and all of a sudden you know way too much about the deepest darkest secrets now that we have this wide open it's is Facebook just the bar is that what it's really become is like the drunken ramblings to the BART I mean you could argue that like the stuff in your brain that happens when you see those likes rolling in is not dissimilar from how alcohol lowers your inhibitions that's that's kind of stretching it but it's kind of fun to think of okay of getting validation yeah yeah yeah well if you combine that with actual alcohol yeah that's like way horse I like this comment from serene joy that just came in privacy is indirectly proportional to convenience I would rather give my android apps access multiple sensitive data for serving me to the full extent another interesting perspective as always sir enjoy thank you for contributing any take back on that one right yeah convenience versus privacy is often there after that people it's the whole thing we're publicly people prefer privacy but privately they yeah and I think that where everyone's becoming smarter Facebook and people that use it about like you know when like a little like jelly fish game asked to have access to all your friends data and you're just like okay three years ago because like you just don't realize what they're entitled to now we're starting to realize what that entitles them to and also the the handset makers and comes the Google software makers like they've done a better job of making sure you're aware that's because those early days like it was like those terms of services you just scroll right past it hit okay and boom you just giving them access everything yeah they're a little bit better now at making sure you understand exactly what you're giving up yeah so we're gonna step into some delicate territory here what we saw yesterday was as always horrifying and humbling what else have we we learned what else can we take away what can we learn from in this situation that developed in San Bruno yesterday well there's not much that we can learn yet because we're still learning what happened good yeah yeah just that this I mean this happens or too often we don't we don't really know all the details but yeah this this happens scary now this individual the the the shooter she came in on a mission because she felt her she was wronged by by YouTube as a platform correct well we don't even really know that for sure these are still trying to determine a motive I mean like our CBS Ola has interviewed the family of the shooter and the her father did mention that that's what she expressed we don't we don't know for sure if that's the actual motive but that's sort of been brought up as the potential it's part of the context you know what might have happened maybe but we still don't know understood I'm glad that we're not speculating here but it is something that you know it's on a lot of people's minds because it's terrifying yeah totally terrifying we want to know why you all grapple for why why did this happen you know what would we are still learning a lot I know that there is a number of Twitter accounts out there searching out and trying to debunk the act of trolling that I never circulates that was one of the other issues that flared up again yes right whenever there's because Humanity is terrible exactly it is this kind of tragic incident like there are trolls out there who are spreading misinformation I mean there's someone who hacked one of the accounts of one of the YouTube employees who first alerted the public that this was even happening so yeah there's just like every time something bad happens like there are there are folks who just sort of make it worse yeah happened again yeah be the first to say that takes a special kind of asshole to try to capitalize on an event like this special kind of Butthead well I'm sticking with my language I mean years ago like we I think a lot of folks look at or heralded Twitter as like new platform for like sharing real time news and sort of crowdsourcing information up to day and now it's like it's become this complete misinformation zone but coming full circle with Facebook we just talked about we you it does illustrate the how hard it is I'm you know I'm the last person to say Jack Dorsey and Zuckerberg oh they have it so hard they're billionaires but it does illustrate the difficulty like we learned about the fact that there was a shooting in our newsroom we learn about it through Twitter yeah that's right we first found out that it was happening and realized we needed to start covering it in a responsible way and you know that's how we learned but then terrible other misinformation was spread at the same time so one step forward two steps back in minutes after we learned about it somebody starts to deviate you down a path of misinformation yeah absolutely Parkland like conspiracy theories pop up like it's just and it just shows you like yeah it's it is a good tool for information still in some respects but you have to be a lot more cautious and critical about what you're seeing yeah the one recurring comment I'm seeing circulated both in our chat and outside of this is that people automatically did assume that this was some kind of disgruntled creator who was mad about ad pocalypse about the deamination plague crossing YouTube right now we'll have to still learn more to figure out exactly what the details were on that but that's a place to start I guess yeah yeah so switching gears real quick just to get back on me happy well maybe this isn't happy but at least it's less utterly depressing certain joist is off topic what's up with all the Tesla buzz so many negative news so much negative news coming in why do they even set unachievable targets well I'm not sure what he's referring to I can't remember cuz a few days ago in my brain I'm like a goldfish I forget everything in like 15 seconds but um nothing like hit some numbers and it was encouraging Tesla misses production go of 2500 Model 3 s's a week that's probably what he's referring to so you can clarify I mean yeah let's see here's the deal so they were yeah they they missed production but I guess they raised more money this year so that's probably why so mixed signals that's what your show yeah you know I mean like the fact that they mr. production don't goals is not great but demand for those cars are still really high so there's clearly a lot of buzz for Tesla gotcha yeah I always feel I always kind of hesitate to draw conclusions when a company misses its own internal goals because that's not like outside world factors you know what I mean like they said really high goal prompt maybe it's possible they just set the goal wrong and they couldn't get there it's kind of like when like there's reports it's very different but on my beat like when BuzzFeed misses a revenue target and people are talking about how that's the end of BuzzFeed oh it's like no no they just said like course not a really high target and they didn't quite make it but they still profited yeah so maybe yeah I gotcha that's a good takeaway so enjoy does clarify production and accident there was an accident oh there was the yeah there was a accident a few days ago I think someone else is an auto pilot accident and I thought sorry correct for rollick I thought I read somewhere like someone else tried to like replicate that and they're like almost got an accent themselves are they trying to replicate an accident on Idol Paulo and then they almost had an accident or something that goes something like that yeah I mean come on we'll have to dig more on this one Mike Shaw says the accident was human error if your car tells you to put your hands on the wheel you should probably put your hands on the wheel so that's the thing it's not like a people treat it like it's autonomous driving it's not it's right level one autonomy like I know there different levels to it yeah but it makes me remember the episode of The Simpsons where Bart steals the car and then he goes cruise control my man and sits in the backseat and then they drive straight into a cornfield or a better more relevant more concurrent was probably the episode of the office where the man tells Michael Devon water yeah life imitates art I did see one thing that I wanted to bring up myself before we shut it down for the day is a Russia tried to launch their first drone delivery and it smashed straight into a wall anybody see that no oh man the video is adorable it's adorable it's adorable they tried to do their own the Amazon like drone and package delivery thing is well done and it's hard making drones that deliver stuff that's hard work man if anybody's looking for a good laugh it's all over the place you'll find it I think we are out of time yes we are so one on we closed it down for the day thanks everybody good discussion yeah on heavy topics on difficult topics we appreciate you being you we'll try to keep it later tomorrow we'll try and try let's just go get the seal or the duck in here yes I think somebody reached out the beeping and overnight that to us all right all right if you liked anything you saw or heard here check us out on CNN our podcast is available on iTunes tune in stitcher feedburner google play music and the Amazon echo see y'all tomorrow take care everyone have a good night