SCOTUS Ok’s WH to Remove Social Misinformation & AI Consultants Are Making BANK

0:28Change is always happening. Good morning Brew Daily Show. I'm Neil Freiman. And I'm Toby Howell. Today, after a decade of false starts, is the self-driving era finally here? Then AI has done more than make NVIDIA shareholders really rich. It's also made consultants really rich. It's Thursday, June 27th. Let's ride.

0:53It is here, the first presidential debate of the election season. Tonight at 9 p.m. Eastern, Joe Biden will square off against Donald Trump in the first instance of a sitting president debating a former president. And that's not all that's unusual about this debate. It comes months earlier than presidential debates in the past, and neither candidate has participated in a debate since their showdown in 2020. And there will be no live audience. Microphones will be muted when the candidates are not asked to talk, and they can't bring in pre-written notes or props. So how can you watch? Well, the debate is being hosted by CNN, but the feed is going to be shared across most other networks and major news sites on the internet.

1:35In short, it'll be hard to miss it. It'll be hard to miss, yeah. First between sitting and former president. First debate hosted by, presidential debate hosted by CNN too. It's also the first debate that the moderator will begin by saying, let's ride. I'm just kidding. But Jake Tapper, Dana Bash, we do give you permission to use it if you want. Now let's hear a word from our sponsor, Yahoo Finance. Neil, yesterday Jensen Huang from NVIDIA answered questions at their annual shareholder meeting. The first question related to the company's competition as more companies gear up to release products to challenge NVIDIA's 80 % market share in AI chips.

2:11Please tell me he named names and said Intel isn't even close to matching them. He played it a little closer to the vest, but I will happily name names about where I came across this information. I will do it for you. Yahoo Finance. You forget that we sit next to each other all day and I see your computer, Toby. I see the purple draped all over it. Listen, they've got the news, okay? And we're in the news business. Well, I am glad you are using our sponsor's product because you are a company man. And if you want to be like Toby and spend all of your time bathing in Yahoo Finance's purple glow, head to yahoofinance.com or download their mobile app to get it directly on your phone.

2:47Tuesday on NBC, Jimmy Fallon and Bozema St. John host the highly anticipated new competition show. I hired 10 creatives from all walks of life. They will be battling it out to see who can impress the world's biggest brands. This is a huge opportunity. This is the battle for the next big idea. This is not play play. We're spending millions of dollars. I'm so excited to embark on this adventure with all of you. Make the best idea win! On brand with Jimmy Fallon. Series premiere Tuesday on NBC. Yesterday, the Supreme Court made a pivotal decision regarding the government's influence on social media companies ruling in favor of the Biden administration.

3:26Let's rewind to 2022. Two states and five social media users sued federal officials for violating their First Amendment rights by being too heavy handed and urging social media companies to suppress certain posts related to COVID-19 vaccines, election fraud, amongst other things. Lower courts sided with the states and users, but yesterday SCOTUS sided with the government bolstering its ability to seek removal of what it might view as misinformation. The ruling comes with immediate significance. The Department of Homeland Security, for instance, can continue to flag post they think might be the work of foreign actors ahead of this year's election.

4:01But the ruling itself didn't dive as much into the sticky First Amendment rights that were at the core of this case. Instead, the court ruled that the users who challenged the administration didn't have standing to sue. So the court kicked the can down the road a bit when it comes to the central question about what First Amendment limits apply to the government's influence on tech companies. But the fact remains that it does give the government a freer hand to talk to social media companies. This was a 6-3 decision with some of the conservative justices going over to the liberal side. Justice Amy Coney Barrett penned the decision and she said, yeah, the The plaintiffs just did not have standing to bring this case in the first place, which is something that we've seen a couple times so far on the Supreme Court's docket over the past few weeks.

4:48She said that the government has not caused their injuries. They have to meet two hurdles, that the government caused their injuries and that there may be injury in the future. She said that those two thresholds had not been met. And one reason why is that because social media companies were already policing information. They were already taking down information or suppressing posts that may not be accurate. And the government was just corresponding with them about that particular thing. It wasn't because of the government that they started doing this. The government may have had a undue influence through these back channel email communications that were brought up during the court proceedings.

5:24But she did not make the link between the fact that the government was talking to social media companies and the fact that they were bringing down posts. Right. The underlying issue here, though, was how much power should the government have to put pressure on social media companies without kind of running into some First Amendment issues? And again, I said kick the can down the road because they did rule on a technicality. But the result of that ruling is that the government can still have its hand in some of these and urging social media companies to take a certain post down. Again, I said it has immediate consequence because we are in an election year.

5:58And one of the big things that the government would love to do, the Department of Homeland Security would love to do is say, wait a second. We think some of these posts are coming from foreign actors. Can we suppress them? Facebook, can we suppress them? X. So it does have national security concerns right away. But then if you zoom out a little bit, there's definitely a loud vocal majority or minority of people who are saying, like, why are we giving the government so much power over these supposedly third party institutions that kind of act as gatekeepers of information right now? And the government would respond, look, we have First Amendment rights just like anybody else.

6:33And for centuries, the United States government and the president has used their position as the bully pulpit, it's called, to sort of put their thumb on the scale. And just, you know, they can talk just like anybody else. So they would respond that we have just a First Amendment right just like anybody else to sway information or put our positions forward. And the interesting part, too, is that some of the cases that were mentioned in this case was the Hunter Biden laptop story from early or from the late 2020 year. And actually, internal communications revealed from that story showed that Twitter execs were very divided on what to do with the company.

7:11There wasn't some sort of influence from the government. And Twitter just kind of rolled over and did what they said. It was very contentious. There was lots of internal documents from lots of different social media companies revealed through this case. And that was another one that I'm sure a lot of people remember. Meanwhile, we just have two days left in the Supreme Court's term. So we should see another flurry of rulings. And yesterday there was another big facepalm by the Supreme Court because someone posted the opinion for a medical abortion for emergencies in Idaho ahead of time. That wasn't a final decision.

7:47They posted it yesterday and Bloomberg got their hands on it. And it said that the Supreme Court is going to allow abortions in medical emergencies in Idaho, where most emergencies, most abortions are banned. So that is one ruling that we kind of already know a hint of because they posted it. And that's not the first time this is leaked from the Supreme Court. Remember, back in 2022, the Roe v. Wade decision was leaked to Politico a couple months ahead of time. Now, Toby and I are going to do our best BBC World Service impression and bring you the latest headlines from around the globe. Not in a British accent, unfortunately.

8:23Let's start in Bolivia, where a dramatic coup attempt lasted all of a few hours. Rebel soldiers tried to storm the presidential palace yesterday in what President Luis Arce called an attempt to overthrow his socialist government. It did not work. The soldiers dispersed and the general who led the revolt was promptly arrested. Still, it reflects pressure on the unpopular government to fix a dire economic situation. Bolivia's natural gas exports have plunged. Its central bank has run out of reserves to defend its peg against the U.S. dollar. And the government is struggling to pay food and diesel subsidies to its people.

8:56Then again, this is nothing new for Bolivia, one of the most politically volatile nations in the world. Since its independence from Spain two centuries ago, it's experienced nearly 200 coups and revolutions. You mentioned the word it was a dramatic coup because it was actually broadcasted live on television that you could literally see President Arce confronting the former army chief who was leading the coup as he stormed up the presidential hallway. So it was very much this real time thing that was playing out. And to make things even more dramatic, Bolivia also has an election upcoming in 2025.

9:28So expect to see more about the Bolivian political situation unfolding. Next on our international tour, a secret espionage trial for Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich began yesterday in a Russian court where he was put on display in a padlock transparent box. Evan has been imprisoned since March of last year on charges that he was gathering information about a Russian defense contractor on behalf of the CIA. He, the Wall Street Journal, and the U.S. government say these charges are complete bogus. He was simply doing his job and that Russia is using Evan as a political pawn. And even as this trial gets going, Russia has not been subtle about its intent to use Evan as a bargaining chip.

10:07The Kremlin says it's down to do a prisoner swap, perhaps for former security operative Vadim Krasikov, serving a life sentence in Germany. The U.S. responded that they aren't going to negotiate in public. Of course, the backdrop to Evan's imprisonment is crumbling relations between the U.S. and Russia after Putin invaded Ukraine in 2022. He is the first journalist to be detained in Russia since the end of the Cold War. Right. Gershkovich faces up to 20 years in prison if the court does find him guilty, which by all accounts they will. Russian courts convict more than 99 percent of defendants who come before them.

10:40So you hear the word sham child thrown around a lot. But it truly is in Russia that it's mostly just a sentencing hearing, not an actual hearing before law. There is also just to say that this does happen. There's another American corporate security executive who was arrested in Moscow for espionage in 2018. He is now serving a 16 year sentence. So there's very real possibility that Evan does do prison time. Of course, you're right. He does want to be used as a bargaining chip. The last time this happened was in 2022 when the U.S. exchanged WNBA star Brittany Greiner for a arms dealer, Victor Bout.

11:19So there is precedent for this, and I'm sure that we'll see a very similar situation with negotiations playing out with Evan. Moving on, after a wave of protests and an attack on the country's parliament, Kenya's president, William Ruto, reversed course yesterday and said he would not sign a controversial tax bill into law. The exact tolls of the protests are still being tallied, but human rights groups have said that at least 23 people were killed with 300 injured after the police cracked down using tear gas and bullets on protesters marching on parliament. Some people did make it into the building and set parts of it on fire just an hour after the legislation was passed.

11:55The bill was intended to raise revenue through higher taxes, which the government said was necessary to pay down the country's debt and cover the cost of infrastructure. But now the president says his government will widen cuts in spending instead. Neil, this was one of the bloodiest days in Kenya recent history, with more press protesters vowing to march again today to call for the resignation of the president and all members of parliament who voted for this bill. Look, Kenya needs to raise revenue. They have 80 billion dollars worth of debt. Twenty seven percent of the revenue is collected is going to debt service.

12:26They are just they went on a huge spending spree borrowing from China and other institutions in the early 2000s to build roads infrastructure. And that has been, you know, overall good for their economy. It is the fastest growing economy in Africa. The problem is they aren't bringing in the tax receipts to be able to pay down these debts. So that is what this whole thing was about. They tried to they tried to raise taxes to raise more revenue to pay off their debt so they don't default. And it has backfired. A part of the issue, too, is that a lot of the protesters did critique the lifestyle of Ruto and his members of his administrations.

13:03They've called on them to limit their expenses. And so that's what Ruto did. He did say that we will cut back on our spending on travel, our cars, our office renovations, the thing that are conspicuously spending within the current administration and institute more austerity measures. So, but we'll see because this situation is unfolding because a lot of people have said they will continue to protest until they see the resignation of this administration. And they have been led by young people. Mostly those are the people leading the protests. Finally, Julian Assange landed back home in his native Australia yesterday, a free man for the first time in 12 years.

13:38The WikiLeaks founder shocked the world when he agreed to a deal with the United States on Wednesday morning, pleading guilty to illegally conspiring to obtain and disseminate classified information. Quick LinkedIn bio on Assange. He was a prodigy programmer who in 2006 started the site WikiLeaks, which published more than 10 million secret documents on everything from internal Sony Pictures communications to emails from Hillary Clinton's campaign manager. A firestorm erupted in 2010 when he published distressing video and confidential documents around the U.S.'s military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, which is one of the largest breaches of classified material in the U.S.

14:18military's history. Facing espionage charges from the U.S., he spent seven years hiding out in the Ecuadorian embassy in London and then five years in British prison. Now, after the plea deal, he is back home. And yet he is still as divisive as ever, cast by some as a free speech crusader and by others as a villain who put lives at risk. Yeah, and his wife, who is also on his legal team, was asked, is he going to continue to reveal these documents? He's going to continue publishing. And she did not rule it out. She called Julian Assange a very principled person who is very beholden to who he is.

14:53And so she said that he will always defend human rights and will always defend victims. So there is a world where he just resumes right where he left off, kind of revealing and posting some of these sensitive internal government documents. Up next, a savior has emerged to pull the consulting industry out of its funk.

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16:16Consultants have been having a bit of a rough go of it recently. McKinsey has cut jobs amid a slowdown in demand. and other firms have been shrinking the size of their new partner classes. But an unlikely savior has come to bail out your favorite Patagonia-vested synergy drivers, AI. Yes, after ChatGPT came out last year, there has been a huge demand from businesses wanting to know what the heck this thing is and how can it help me make money. Consultancies were more than happy to step in. Boston Consulting Group now earns a fifth of all its revenue through work related to artificial intelligence.

16:49that's pretty remarkable considering two years ago it was zero and they aren't alone outside of bcg mckinsey accenture and even ibm's consulting arms are seeing sales rise and are hiring in droves again as companies try to navigate the age of ai neil consulting and ai they go together like you and i i saw this firsthand yesterday because i moderated a panel at an event that was exclusively about onboarding new ai and guess who was there accenture ibm i so i saw this firsthand how consultants are getting into the game about deploying AI at businesses because companies see this as a huge cost saver, as a way to become more efficient and lean to drive productivity.

17:31And it is kind of a confusing technology with a lot of different applications, a lot of ways you can do it from regulatory things to getting chatbots up for customer service. There's just like or just mining data. So there's a lot of potential applications here. And the hype is through the roof. So companies are desperate to know what to do. But, you know, Some of them don't have the capabilities to send a dedicated team to figure out how AI can help them. So they're turning to these consultants and the consultants are saying, come to Papa, come to Papa. This is not the first time we've made this comparison, but you have to think back to the original tech boom, internet boom in the early 2000s where businesses also stampeded to consultants for counsel about, hey, what is the internet?

18:12And like, I know, I don't know what a website does, but I need one. And I think you're seeing a lot of the same things from companies right now where they don't fully grasp it. And so consultancies are more than willing to step in and hold their hand and say, this is what we can build. This is what we can do for you. And, yeah, it is leading to record revenues for them as well. It's so interesting, too, because literally earlier this year we were talking about the slowdown. McKinsey laying off workers. There's just not enough demand. These places are too bloated. And then all of a sudden, here you are.

18:44McKinsey said they're deriving 40 % of their business this year from generative AI. It has just been this massive boom for them. And it's just funny, too, that the jokes write themselves, too. Like, it could be the blind, lean the blind, or maybe the consultancies are actually doing a very good job. I know. Well, I don't know if they're doing a good job. I mean, there's going to be hits and misses. One thing that we just recently talked about was how McDonald's is closing down its AI drive-thru experiment. That was done with a IBM as consultants. And now after a few years, that did not work out.

19:17They were spitting, this AI was spitting out ridiculous orders, you know, a hundred chicken nuggets, nine iced teas, bacon on top of vanilla ice cream. So I think there is going to be some growing pains here with how consultants and companies work together to deploy AI. It's funny too, because a lot of AI companies are trying to figure out how they can make money, what their business model is. yet here consultancies are making money hand over fist. Self-driving cars are a dream that plenty of companies have tried to sell us in recent years, most of all Elon Musk at Tesla. But while Elon was promising robo-taxi on earnings call after earnings call, Google's Waymo has slowly but surely been bringing self-driving cars to the mainstream.

19:58As of this week, its robo-taxis are now available to all users in San Francisco, expanding its ride-hailing service, which had previously only been available to a select amount of riders. Waymo has flown a bit under the radar compared to other self-driving companies. GM's cruise has made headlines for collisions and accidents while Tesla's full self-driving feature still requires an attentive driver at the wheel. But Waymo has slowly but surely expanded its operations with plans to launch in Los Angeles and Austin as well this year. Are we sleeping on Waymo a little bit? Absolutely. It's crazy to think that in Phoenix and in San Francisco now, You can just take out your phone and order a taxi that won't be driven by a human.

20:41It'll be completely a robot. We've been waiting for this for decades. We've been promised this for so long. There have been so many stops and starts. But in two American cities, you can call a self-driving car to take you somewhere. It is absolutely incredible to think about. But it's been this drip, drip, drip of progress. So we haven't had this crowning moment to say, yes, the self-driving era has arrived. And there have been so many. you know it's always been one step forward two steps back for this industry but this is a two or three step forward moment right yeah part of the issue and why this snuck up on us and we're saying that Waymo slept on is that news outlets aren't very good at covering technological advances that take a while to evolve over time we're much better at having something like chat gpt drop and then like the entire paradigm has shifted and suddenly nvidia is the most valuable company in the world.

21:29When you compare it to AI, self-driving has taken a lot longer to materialize. I mean, Waymo is a 15-year-old company at this point. And then also part of the reason why maybe we haven't thought about self-driving as advanced as it actually is, is that we do cover most of the negative news associated with it because there has been a lot of negative news. And Waymo recently had some negative news as well. They hit a poll in Arizona. They've had to do a recall all over software. So again, it's been very bumpy. It hasn't been smooth sailing. But part of the reason why we're taking this moment to say it's doing well is because you're right, that is a pretty magical experience being able to call a robo-taxi in two major cities in the U.S.

22:10now. Finally, we are going to Neil's Numbers, the segment where I share three stats from the week's news that will be like instantly downloading all of Ken Burns' documentaries into your brain. My first number is a good news, bad news situation. First, the good news. Pedestrian deaths on U.S. roads decreased in 2023, according to a new report by the Governor's Highway Safety Association. Last year saw a 5.4 % fall in the annual number of pedestrian deaths. The first decrease since COVID began and certainly a step in the right direction. Now the less good news, the pedestrian death total of 7 ,318 is still 14 % more than before the pandemic in 2019.

22:52Yeah, COVID really increased the danger for Americans walking on streets since emptier roads allowed for more speeding, alcohol use rose, and traffic enforcement declined. Between 2010 and 2022, the number of pedestrian deaths in the U.S. rose nearly 77 % to record levels. But progress is progress, and advocates hope they can build on last year's encouraging decline. We've talked about a lot of how bigger cars have led to more pedestrian tests, but truly the real concern when it comes to pedestrian deaths is inebriation. Because 30 % of fatalities involved a pedestrian who had a blood alcohol level that exceeded the legal limit, and then 19 % involved a driver above that limit.

23:31So it still is alcohol is probably one of the central driving factors, as well as the fact that the U.S. is set up mostly for cars, very little infrastructure to promote walking or biking or any other means of transportation. So a lot of factors have kind of combined in this, but it is good to see the numbers a little bit lower than they were in 2020 and 2019. And if you want to look at a city that's doing it right and is perhaps a model for other American cities to follow, it's Hoboken, New Jersey. I mean, they haven't had a traffic death from somebody in a car, a cyclist or a pedestrian since 2017.

24:07They are doing it so right. There's a mayor there who said there's this, you know, there's this concept in urban planning called Vision Zero. And it's basically eliminating traffic deaths. And every city is trying to do that. But Hoboken is doing it right. And one of the biggest strategies that they've employed is called daylighting, where you remove parking spots from close to intersections because that reduces visibility. And the idea is that if people can see better at intersections, then they will lead to a decrease in traffic crashes. And that's absolutely happened. There's other sort of things you can play with in terms of infrastructure and putting curb buffers or, you know, just limiting speed limit.