PGA Tour's Mysterious Merger, Instagram's Pedophile Problem

23:57Yeah. This is nothing but not even thinly veiled anti-Semitism. Totally. And when you have the most, arguably the most famous news journalist or entertainment journalist, whatever you want to call him, in America, in a bow tie, on Twitter, basically engaging. They had a lot of people watching it. First episode. First episode. Let me stir up anti-Semitic feelings among people. By the way, who are the same people who are going to believe me when in the same episode I say that UFOs in extraterrestrial life are, open quote, actually real, close quote. Well, there are some questions about that, but go ahead.

24:40Well, I don't know. He took it too far. It's a little more. Anyway, he took it too far. Let's keep in mind. He's, okay, he's violated his non-compete. That's an issue. It's interesting. More than anything, he is a raging anti-Semite. That's the big story here. Yeah, I agree. You know, he's making a show. Elon's talked about it like shows. He's talked about it like a show. And then he's like, it's actually, he can still tweet. He can still tweet as much as he wants. He just can't do a show. And that's what he's doing here, 100%. Like, come on, stop it. Stop it, Tucker. And by the way, just so you know, I asked my mother, interesting, speaking of Lucky, who watched Tucker, despite his insults of me.

25:17I said, are you watching him on Twitter? She's like, what? No. Why? Like, you know, there's that audience that did so well for him at Fox. We'll see if, well, he's not going to get to do it. That's the way it's going to go. So he's going to lose. They may settle, but probably they'll keep them on the bench. So sorry, Tucker. Sorry. Lastly, the SEC, speaking of badasses, the SEC suddenly woke up and they're coming for crypto's biggest players, suing both Binance and Coinbase this week. Both are accused of selling assets that should have been registered as securities. But in Binance's case, its chief executive, Cheng Pen Zhao, also known as CZ, is also accused of civil fraud.

25:55Binance's charge was siphoning off billions of dollars of customer money to a separate company owned by CZ. That's on top of nearly a dozen other charges, including manipulating investors. Both Coinbase and Binance have said they intend to fight back. At the time of his downfall, by the way, of SBF's downfall, Sandbag and Fried's, he tweeted, SBF is one of the greatest fraudsters in history. They had a bit of a beef between each other. But, you know, this is SEC hasn't been terrifically clear near as the government, whether it's a commodity or security. But here's Gary Gensler going for it. I just feel like we need to just finally acknowledge two truths.

26:35Crypto is a levered Ponzi scheme and isn't a thing and we just shouldn't be talking about it as much. And headsets don't work, folks. Anyways, thanks for my TED talk. What do you mean headsets don't work? It's a mixed reality. weird. Anyways. Isn't that spatial? It's a new paradigm in computing. Oh, I can't wait to. I'm going to send you a picture of me in it next week. But nonetheless, yes, they're going to sort out whether this is security or commodity. They're going to try to fight back. These companies are in trouble. This just isn't. Of course there's securities. Of course they should be regulated.

27:12They're trying to get it over at the CFT or whatever, commodities, future trade, whatever. Do you have any thoughts on Gary Gensler on this issue? In my opinion, Gary Gensler and the SEC have done everything right here. I just wish they'd done it in X time instead of 8X. I feel like the sheriff showing up after everyone is kind of bloody. It's like, well, okay. It's great that you're here. Yes. But Gary is deliberate. He's very smart. He's not easily rattled. I enjoyed seeing him at your conference. And he's another one of these people that I find, I find it encouraging that such talented people with a lot of options decide to go to work for the government.

27:56Where does he thankless job where everybody just second guesses him all day long? Yeah, I think Coinbase is already struggling, you know, and Binance. We'll see. Binance, I think, is probably in much more of a world of trouble than Coinbase is. Anyway, let's get to our first big story.

28:15First, a warning. The story is distressing and probably not appropriate for young listeners, so heads up. Pedophiles on Instagram are openly marketing child sexual abuse material, or CSAM, as it's called, and they're using Instagram's features to find customers. That's according to a report in the Wall Street Journal. It was a tremendous piece, speaking, this is a new scarplown property. It's been doing an amazing job at reporting, by the way. Let me separate that out. That sites work by the Stanford Internet Observatory. This is Alex Stamos, who we know. They found that Instagram's algorithm is helping users find accounts that market CSAM.

28:49To be clear, Instagram isn't hosting it. These accounts are directing users to websites and other platforms where they can purchase materials, but Instagram is accused of making it easy for users to find these accounts through hashtags and features like suggested for you. Instagram even auto-completed some searches with terms like boys and C-P, child pornography. Sanford researchers found over 400 accounts that claim to be created by children themselves, and some accounts are offered in-person meetups. Metta's response was really, well, we only found 10 ,000 or something. It was, it's very hard to catch.

29:23I've done lots of interviews of this. Very difficult, pernicious, terrible. But again, something that should be the very lowest tier of ability to stop, right? They should be able to be doing this. They've laid a lot of workers off. I was told by Alex that they have laid a lot of, they're still at it, but they have lesser workers. Met employees told the Washington Post they worried about the effects of layoffs on platform safety. Of course, they were able to take down posts about abortion pills. So what do you think? Thoughts? Well, it's shocking, but it's not surprising. And that is, I don't think anyone at Facebook is pro-child pornography.

30:02No. I think that there are people at Meta today that are horrified about this. And the problem we have in corporate America is poor incentives where money has washed over Washington and created regulatory capture, where amoral people who aren't bad people, but they're amoral, if they can put enough distance between them and an opiate addict or a child that's being exploited, that the money that fills the void blinds them to how directly their actions are attributed to these things. And it's kind of a failure of the U.S. public to elect individuals who create an algebra of deterrence. And, I mean, look, we had a perp walk and we had a woman and her partner go to prison for 10 plus years because she lied to her institutional investors.

30:54The question here, I don't think any of this stops until there's a perp walk. Yeah. And then I think they figure it out. On this issue? I agree. I heartily agree. You know, it's interesting. Their current system, there's a database of these known CSAM images. The issues they can't detect new images. You know, it's confusing whether it's an innocent image of your kid, you know, in the pool or something like that. The network is what's suggesting similar accounts to users. It's helped grow the network, this AI thing. Now, there's been some legislation thoughts. The Section 230 has carved, already has a carve out for prostitution and sex trafficking.

31:31You know, Senator Lindsey Graham wants to take it further. He backs a bill, the earn it bill, that removes Section 30 protections from social networks so they don't adopt best practices around CSAM. He's introduced the bill before, and it doesn't get through. Interestingly, the Stanford report said that TikTok doesn't appear to have this issue. Other networks, of course, had issues. and the Stanford team said Twitter was fast to remove accounts marketing CSAM, but they have a massive problem because he's laid off everybody. And Alex tweeted about this, that they don't have access, that Musk has just recently cut off access so they can't study it to the API.

32:08But it's embarrassing for Zuckerberg because he was someone who has said this is important. You know, this is important. I bet I don't. I mean, I have not been a fan of this. I bet he's horrified by this personally, professionally. But Instagram starts from a place of perversion. Meaning? What does the algorithm promote and love? A 16-year-old girl. And let's be honest, she's a girl, not a woman, taking images of herself in sexualized outfits. We love that. And then you get to be evaluated by your peers and strange men all over the world. Yeah. That's fucking perverted. Yeah, I would agree. I had that experience.

32:51Louis was like, look at this. Like, girls putting him up that he knew. And I was like, uh. And I want to be clear. I think I'm one of these free the nipple people. I think on TikTok and Instagram or wherever over the age of 18, if you want to be topless as a woman, like a guy can be topless, go for it. Right. Anyone under the age of 18 should be fully clothed. Yeah. So age gating. It gets back to this age gating issue. It goes back to, or maybe not even on the goddamn network. We age gate everything else. Yep. But if you can, if a 15 year old can go on and become an influencer by posing in just incredibly sexualized positions, what do you know?

33:33There's child pornography on the same side from the same company. These make it easy. It makes it easy. These people used to have to go to places. The internet has made it easy, and you cannot make it easy for these people. Well, it's let a very unfortunate, very small group of people find each other and create network effects, right? Yeah. And some of that is good, right? The parents of kids with rare childhood diseases. There's some very positive things. But it all comes back to the same thing for me. until we see a recognizable figure in tech do a perp walk, none of this stops. They're faster than us.

34:09And until then, they have to spend the money on safety systems, Twitter cutting everybody. That's just, you know where it's going. You know where it's going. Facebook cover cutting people for this. Substitute have to with should. Because I don't think they feel they have to. And you know what's going to be the mother of all shit shows when we've been talking about this? The six months before the election. Yeah. Even if Twitter decided, well, we would give up money for some sanctity of purity around our elections and we don't want another January 6th and this is getting real. They're not gonna have the, they're not gonna be able to.

34:42They're not gonna be able to keep up with these guys. Yep, I would agree. This is, it's just, this was, I highly recommend reading this article. There's been a number of them like this over the years. Never seems to change. It needs to now be legislated. They need, everyone should back this bill. I don't know a whole lot about it, but a bill like this where they must do it or else they suffer consequences for it and significant consequences. And maybe that protection should be taken out of Section 230. It just seems like everybody certainly can agree. And I understand the panic around it, that people try to get too panicky about generalized pornography on the Internet.

35:19Look, I'm sorry, there's going to be pornography in any medium. But this, you're right, and they shouldn't be on the platform. I mean, I've seen some of the stuff and it's even the even the light, the stuff of what you're talking about, young girls posing. I'm it's so so I sound censorious. I sound like a, you know, but no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. I have promotes. I have good friends whose daughters at the age of 15 are putting images of themselves on Instagram that are horrifying for their parents and their friends. And then horrifying for the 15-year-old when she gets to be about 17 and 18.

36:02Yeah, yeah. And develops in her prefrontal cortex and her judgment kicks in. Yeah, it's true. But instead, Instagram's like, no, let's let you make bad mistakes at scale. Yes, yep. That's exactly bad mistakes. Because we have algorithms that like it. And I mean, it just... And that's not even the pernicious stuff that's really absolutely child pornography and the ability for these people. These people should not be able to meet in a park. Like, I'm sorry, this is the class of people that really, it's sickening, it's sickening, it's sickening. Read the article. Let's go on a quick break. When we come back, we'll talk about golf branding and Saudi Arabia.

36:43We'll take a listener question about the future of Reddit.

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39:10Scott, we're back with our second big story. The biggest feud in professional golf ended in a merger. The fight led to a merger. They were really fighting. That's what happened last week as the PGA Tour announced that it's joining with Saudi-backed Live Golf to form a new venture. No name yet. The deal is expected to go through in a few weeks and will include Europe's DP World Tour. But it's a combination of the American and Saudi groups is the most surprising. The two have been engaged in very, I would say, vicious lawsuits and including the head of the PGA essentially, you know, saying, why do we want the Saudis calling them all kind of, you know, talk about 9-11, talking about the murder of Jamal Khashoggi, et cetera, et cetera.

39:50Suddenly, and he said, I know I sound hypocritical now, which of course he does, because in one suit, the PGA accused Saudi Arabia of using golf to, quote, sports watch the recent history of Saudi atrocities. Now they're hanging out. Now they are hanging out. And one of the things he said on an interview was, maybe we shouldn't have been so confidential about this and talk to more stakeholders. But boy, is this getting a lot of slapback. PGA hasn't really offered an explanation except to say, yes, they're hypocritical. Senate Democrats have called for an investigation. Saudi Arabia's public investment fund will spend an untold amount,$3 billion, allegedly, on the new organization.

40:28It'll probably anger some of the PGA's own golfers. Some turn down huge offers from Liv to stay with the PGA Tour. Tiger Woods was reportedly offered more than$700 million to join, and he declined. So what do you think? This is the biggest business story of the week, if not the month, and that effectively what has happened is there has been a creeping takeover of a U.S. sport or an international or a Western sport by the kingdom. It's not the kingdom buying Man City. It's not the kingdom getting messy to come to Saudi Arabia. They own Newcastle United Football Club. Just go ahead. Anyways, but what you have is an entire sport has acquiesced to what Logan Roy would say is that money wins.

41:10And Jay Monahan should be fired. And at some point, when you grab the hands of 9-11 widows and invoke 9-11 as moral reason why we can't do this, and it's not Tiger Woods that really lost out here. It was a tier two golfer. For sports, I mean, you got in golf, you're 10 years longer. You maybe have 15 years to make enough money to maintain your family's lifestyle, which they have gotten used to, a superstar lifestyle for the next 50 years. When a lot of these guys don't know what they're going to do other than maybe buy an auto dealership. You know, they're not they're never going to make that kind of money again.

41:49And one of the worst things that can happen to you is when you make millions of dollars in your 20s and 30s and then tens of thousands in your 40s and 50s. Unlike most careers. Because it's all gone. Where you get better as you get older. Sports, you get worse at as you get older. There are a lot of, imagine you're a tier two golfer. These guys came at you and said, join Live, we'll give you 30 to 50 million dollars over the next five years. You're financially secure. And you bought into this xenophobic nationalism, moral righteousness rap, and you turned it down. And now you're finding out that Jay Moynihan, as he was holding the hands of 9-11 widows, was negotiating with them.

42:28And now they don't get that money. They're now working for a monopoly and all of their pricing power has gone away and they got to sign up for the same deals they've always had. Do you think it'll get pushed back? I don't know. I agree. He should be fired. This is just – he was – they had high dudgeon about the Saudis and now they're, oh, well, you know, we don't want to compete. We don't want to compete. We want to maintain our monopoly status and we're outgunned. That's right. And they're hurting us because they're spending money. And of course, that's what the Saudis do. This is sports washing, no question.

42:58This is from a Twitter user, James Heskey, I thought was one of the best tweets. As part of the merger, the PGA will control holes 1 through 8 and 12, 16, and the Saudis will do 9-11. So I want to be clear. I'm actually, I believe we need to engage with the kingdom. I think it's hard to find moral clarity in geopolitics. The kingdom is becoming a swing vote on the global stage, fourth largest military. I actually think that MBS doesn't get enough credit for pivoting to capitalism. I am less hateful of the kingdom than a lot of people, and I've been to Riyadh. This is gross. Specifically, Jay Monaghan, when it reminds me a little bit, but on steroids, of these tech people that pretend to be all woke, and then their employees actually say, well, we would really like, you know, daycare.

43:46We need some money. They're visiting Yasser who runs the TIF. We need daycare. And they're like, well, no. He brings his moral superiority to work every day to try and convince young men who have a limited tenure in terms of their ability to make money to not take the quote-unquote dirty oil money and then he takes it and he's negotiating as he's preaching. Yep, agreed. Here's a check. Go the fuck home and be a raging hypocrite somewhere else. But the sad part is, the sad part is, it won't matter. It won't matter. Do you think it goes through? Maybe it doesn't go through? If this gets politically hot enough, could there be a CFIUS review or something?

44:27Yeah, let's make it politically hot. Before he was, it reminds you of Donald Trump who accused the Saudis of having links to 9-11, which they did. And of course, he changed his tune when he got billions of dollars. These people are bought and paid for. It's sickening. And that's fine. I hope the 9-11 victims Kingdoms, the families go after this. I hope our elected officials do. Not just the Republicans should do it too. This is just astonishing. If Jay Moynihan had said, I'm a capitalist, we're going to do what's best for shareholder value, I respect that. And the kingdom has more money. The kingdom basically did the PGA, what Amazon did to almost every retailer and Netflix did all cable companies.

45:04They just came in with an army of capital that no one could compete with. Yeah. But there is an antitrust question. last year the PGA announced it would ban players who left to join Liv. Liv sued, saying the PGA has a monopoly on professional golf. It does. That suit is going away. But if Liv thought that was a monopoly, then what is this, would we say? A bigger monopoly. A bigger monopoly. A monopoly that's better funded now. Yeah. Like this is, I think this brings up a host of issues. But what really people, I mean, this is, when you think about this, The kingdom has done a creeping takeover of an entire sport.

45:41This isn't buying the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Can you imagine the Chinese doing this, trying this number? No, I agree. I know we have to deal with the Saudis, obviously. But honestly, as soon as we don't have to, I'll be thrilled. As soon as we get to nuclear and other energies, renewables, etc., I'm thrilled to leave them behind, these people. But of course we have to deal with them. But imagine the Chinese doing this. Yeah, but I don't, I want to be clear. They wouldn't let it happen. I think the deal should go through. I wouldn't try and block the deal. No, I wouldn't. Because I do think it's going to be good for golf.

46:14I think capitalism is important. I think the players are going to make more money. I think the different affiliates, I think it's going to be good for the U.S. economy and U.S. golfers and European golfers. And I think money wins in this case. I really do. I suppose. If you're going to start pretending to give a flying fuck about LGBTQ rights in the Gulf and use that as a means to influence impressionable young people who look up to you as the head of that organization and they turn down capital and economic security and you invoke all of these very emotionally manipulative call signs as you're negotiating with these folks, get out of town.

46:57I mean, out of town, Jay, get the fuck out of town. Get out of town. It really is. And here's what it says. It says all of these. It says it sends all these signals to young men, male and female CEOs that it's OK to lie. Have no shame. PGA, have no shame. You're shameful. It's literally like there is no decorum anymore. Well, you know, it's all the Silicon Valley people rushing to Saudi Arabia and kissing their ass to get money. And I don't think there's anything wrong with that. It's fine. I've kissed a lot of ass for money. I don't want to hear a word won for them about anything else. That's all.

47:40They're just, they've got bought and paid for, which is fine. Okay, if that's how you want to. I just, I can't imagine how he could have said these things publicly and then been in meetings. And the guy who did it, Yasser, I'm going to mispronounce his last name, is the head of PIF. He was on the board of Uber. Everybody likes Yasser. You know, he's very friendly. And although at the time when he was, when the Saudis were investing in Uber, a lot of people on the board were like, and it was right around the Khashoggi stuff, were trying to get him off, you know, because of the, obviously the implications of that.

48:14Anyway, well done, Yasser. But you're sports washing and it doesn't matter what you do, you're still sports washing. And Jay, go fuck yourself. Correct? Is that the correct answer? I agree with the latter part of that. I think American companies and organizations should engage commercially and financially with the kingdom. They're still sports washing. No doubt. And whatever. And a lot of men spend a lot of money on sports teams to impress their fourth wife and pretend they're never going to die. I get it. They also didn't kill a journalist and dismember him. Okay. But at some point, does that, okay.

48:46So do we no longer engage with the kingdom forever? No, not at all. But this is a win for them. 100%. And guess what? The deepest pocket wins a lot. Chinese have the deepest pockets. We wouldn't let them do it ever, ever. I think that's an interesting point. I think that's an interesting point. Would we let the Chinese take over PGA? Or the tennis tour? Never. Well, they've taken over media, Cara. They're trying. No, they have. They have. What else do they own? Under the age of 25, they have taken over media. Yes. Yes. That is correct. But people are all up in arms about it. Some of us. Well, you are.

49:28Some of us. Many of us are. Anyway, in any case, Jay, go fuck yourself. Scott and I agree, you should go fuck yourself. You know what's shocking that surprises me? Golf is on a tear. Is it? Golf is doing really well. I just met with this guy, Angus, from a Scottish private equity firm, just because I'm Scottish and trying to figure out a way to work more with Scotsman. And they're investing in this fantastic concept called putt shack. I love anything that gets families out of the house and together. Do you golf? And it's tech. I used to golf and then I decided once I got out of the service industry and no longer felt the need to have father-son relationships with clients, I gave it up forever.

50:05I can't. If I never play golf again, I'm fine. Anyways. The Swisher boys play golf. It's a wonderful sport and it's addictive. But these things are amazing. You go and it's kind of technology-driven golf and they do all these fun holes and you can drink and then it tells you what your score is and it gamifies it. Anyways, I'm thinking about investing in putt shack. Okay. Putt shack. Okay. Putt shack. But golf is on fire. Get this. Rounds played in 2021 increased 19%. About 20 % of American sports fans follow golf compared to American football. I thought golf 10 years ago, I would have guessed that golf was in structural decline.

50:43And it's not. It's doing really well. All right. Well, pickleball, pickleball, everybody. OK, Scott, let's get if the families come for pickleball, I'm getting in their way. OK, Scott, let's pivot to a listener question. You've got you've got I can't believe I'm going to be a mailman. You've got mail. Hey, Kara and Scott. I'm wondering if you guys have a take on the chaos that's been going on on Reddit this week. Reddit announced that ahead of their IPO going public later in 2023, they are going to begin charging third-party apps for use of their API, which will force most of these third-party apps to shut down and funnel the majority of users to the official Reddit app.

51:22I'm curious how a company like Reddit presents themselves as a profitable company to investors without alienating a user base that is by and large pretty resistant to being advertised to or becoming the commodity in terms of eyeballs that are sold to advertisers. Thanks. Bye. That's a great question. We were going to talk about Reddit because they had layoffs this week, about 90 people at 5 % of the workforce. They definitely are mad about these, angry about these API changes. A lot of people are doing this. Twitter's doing it. Many people are charging for API. They say third-party apps help with issues like accessibility for visually impaired people.

52:00Many of Reddit's volunteer moderators use bots to help with moderation tasks. These bots cost money after the API change. Many Reddit communities plan to go dark on June 12th in protest. But most networks ban third-party apps. Twitter did it. They're all of them. You can't do it with Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, the popular third-party app for YouTube shutdown after a legal threat from Google. My sons use Reddit all the time for video. And at some point, they need to make money from all that usage, presumably. You know, isn't that precious that there's apps and APIs that don't want to be charged money for something that was free?

52:37And there's two sides of the trade. Go somewhere else that brings you the same value that's free. Well, this is a company that was more shaggy than others. It's a for-profit firm. It's got investors. It's got employees with stock options that want their own economic security. This is about, and I understand there's a nice vibe there and a nice culture. I think this will be almost meaningless. There'll be a loud, vocal minority that'll take to Twitter. There'll be a few high profile, you know, Birkenstock will remove their presence from Amazon. Less Birkenstock than dude at Reddit, but go ahead.

53:09And Reddit is prepping for an IPO. Which they've had to delay. Is that right? I think Reddit is a phenomenon. I think they do a great job. But I just don't. I think this is what every other company that's serious about profitability and going public does. And there's two sides of the trade. If you're unhappy, go somewhere else. Yeah. One of the things that reminds me of many years ago, Twitter used to be super third-party app friendly. And then one day they weren't. And I remember the meeting. They had those Twitter. They had those, I forget what it was, the bird conference or whatever. I was at it with, I think Dick Costa was the CEO, and everybody was up in arms that they were, you know, that they had sort of sidelined a lot of the third-party apps and who had grown, you know, they had encouraged them for years so people would use Twitter.

53:59And then they're like, guess what? The Twitter app is all that counts. And I remember a lot of these third-party app people being shocked. Like, they're like, Kara, can you believe it? I'm like, yeah. Like, you're riding off their dime. Facebook did the same thing when it cracked down for lots of reasons on third-party apps. It is about the business, whether it's Facebook or Instagram, TikTok, or Twitter, or any of these things, charging for, it seems inevitable. I don't, you know, it's a nice thing to be able to give, but they need to make money. Correct? 100%. That's it. That's where it is. We're sisters from another mother on this.

54:34Tonight, we're agreeing on so many things. Third-party apps can, other groups do push it, Mastodon and other Fediverse services encourage developers to build their own apps. And it can create a really exciting ecosystem. Often the company buys the most popular of those in the end, you know, the one that's most creative. And it does, it definitely leads to creativity around usage of these things because the companies, you have to wait for the company's app to update or be, to add features and stuff like that. So there are good parts of these third-party apps, but ultimately they always end up being, you know, at the mercy of the bigger companies and they change, they always end up charging or limiting or whatever.

55:11They give it away to build traffic and affinity, and then they start typically charging. That's the model. And I think as a percentage of gross revenue, retailers on Amazon, third-party retailers, have gone from something like 24 % of revenue to Amazon to 50%. I mean, this is just, this is how the game is played. The bigger question is, is a specific industry, and I don't know what you would call the subset of this industry, is it so concentrated that they have monopoly power and they need to be broken up? I think that's a fair question that should be asked. Absolutely. But as it relates to a group of people, you know, getting upset.

55:46Well, okay. You know. Well, Amazon gets the matter. It'll be a lot less expensive than a mixed reality headset. Stop with that. I'm going to see it. I'm so excited to see it. Oh, God. In any case, Reddit person, sorry. So sorry. Guess what? It is capitalism after all. The CEO, Steve Huffman, probably would say the same. Anyway, if you've got a question of your own that you like answered, send it our way. Go to nymag.com slash pivot to submit a question for the show or call 855-51-PIVOT. All right, Scott, one more quick break. We'll be back for predictions.

56:39business. This is where Odoo comes in. It's the only business software you'll ever need. Odoo is an all-in-one, fully integrated platform that handles everything. That means CRM accounting, inventory, e-commerce, HR, and more. No more app overload. No more juggling logins. Just one seamless system that makes work easier. And the best part is that Odoo replaces multiple expensive platforms for a fraction of the cost. It's built to grow with your business, whether you're just starting out or you're already scaling up. Plus, it's easy to use, customizable, and designed to streamline every process.

57:10It's time to put the clutter aside and focus on what really matters, running your business. Thousands of businesses have made the switch, so why not you? Try Odoo for free at odoo.com. That's O-D-O-O dot com.

57:28Support for the show comes from Odoo. Running a business is hard enough, and you don't need to make it harder with a dozen different apps that don't talk to each other. One for sales, another for inventory, a separate one for accounting. Before you know it, you find yourself drowning in software and processes instead of focusing on what matters, growing your business. This is where Odoo comes in. It's the only business software you'll ever need. Odoo is an all-in-one, fully integrated platform that handles everything. That means CRM accounting, inventory, e-commerce, HR, and more. No more app overload, no more juggling logins, just one seamless system that makes work easier.

58:00And the best part is that Odoo replaces multiple expensive platforms for a fraction of the cost. It's built to grow with your business, whether you're just starting out or you're already scaling up. Plus, it's easy to use, customizable, and designed to streamline every process. It's time to put the clutter aside and focus on what really matters, running your business. Thousands of businesses have made the switch, so why not you? Try Odoo for free at odoo.com. That's O-D-O-O dot com.

58:34Okay, Scott, let's hear a prediction. This is the third prediction I got right. I'm just saying. I'm getting good at it. I'm learning at your feet, so to speak. So, I have two that are really boring. The first is Jay Monahan. I love the term that someone used for Chris Licht, that he'd lost the room. Jay Monahan has lost the locker room. Ah, yes. I can't imagine how many golfers who stood to make$10 to$100 million over the next few years have now been totally, totally fucked. Because now they work for the same monopoly they used to. And Liv's going to say, oh, okay, great. You know, you're now in a worse negotiating position than you were.

59:18And they're like, Jay, we fucked up. We believed you. And I think that he's gone. Yeah, all the agents must be calling him. And I think that in order, they'll try and put a good face on it and say, And Jay will declare victory and say, this is a good moment for me to move on. He's out. And then I think the next big issue we're going to hear about in the present. Maybe he could work at CNN. But go ahead. There you go. There you go. Just, yeah. Did I tell you Chris Lick offered me a show? And then he was fired 11 days later. We talked about it earlier. You're a typeoid Mary, as you said. But go ahead.

59:54Oh, my God. Yeah, that's not happening, Scott. Just FYI. No, I've gotten used to that. I've gotten used to my face for podcasting. Stay away from very nice Amy and Tellist. You stay away from her. Yeah, trust me. No one's going to call me. Anyways, and then I think the political hot potato that's about to emerge in the presidential race, especially on the Republican side as they go after Biden, is the listening station and facility that the Chinese are building in Cuba. Oh. That's going to be a big deal. I agree. I agree. For people who don't know, there's this report in several news organizations that China is paying Cuba to create a listening station 100 miles from the U.S., which, of course, they would do.

1:00:31It's sort of the Cuban Missile Crisis 2.0 cyber version. I think it's a big deal. Do you have any predictions? I do. I do think the entry of Chris Christie into this. I didn't see that. How was it? Oh, he's so funny. He's so he's really good. I really, you know, a friend of mine worked for him when he was a prosecutor in New Jersey, a federal prosecutor, and said he's the most talented speaker, you know, argument maker and not a fan of his politics in any way, but was like, had to give it to him kind of thing. And I got to agree, he's already on the move doing really good explanations of why Trump sucks.

1:01:10He's being the flak jacket. And he's, I don't know if it's effective, but I have to tell you, again, my mom was like, well, did Trump cause all that deficit? I didn't know. And it was interesting. I was like, oh yeah. And she goes, well, that's terrible. And I'm like, huh, interesting. Like, right? Like, it works. I think he's going to be really interesting. I think he's going to, people think he's not going to be effective. I think he's going to be very effective at calling out a lot of the Trump stuff that's ridiculous. Just, you know, the constant. Chris Christie comes across as authentic. He does.

1:01:42He's really, I mean, he was way too close with Trump, obviously. But, and that's where he'll get dinged. It's like, you liked him until you hated him. But you know what? So what? So what? I don't care about that. He also did a really good thing. I guess Trump calls him fat, which is sort of pot kettle kind of situation. He had a great comeback for that, too. It's really a mistake to argue with him. I think he's going to be effective. That's my prediction. That's my prediction. Mike Pence, less so. Although he was pretty firm against Trump. What he did, interestingly, I'll finish on this, is he was on Dana Bash.

1:02:15He was on CNN. A very good interview. Dana did a good job. He said, anyone who violates the Constitution should never be president. Anyone who tries to make someone to violate the Constitution, shouldn't be president. He's referring to Trump. And then she asks, will you support the Republican nominee? And he goes, yes, no matter who. Okay. That makes sense. Like, you're like, oh, God, Mike Pence. Consult the Bible immediately. This is really crazy. All right, Scott, that's the show. We'll be back on Tuesday with more Pivot and lots of news, I think. The indictment for Trump is coming down. There's all kinds of stuff.

1:02:48Hopefully, the haze will be gone. Please read us out. Today's show is produced by Lara Neiman, Evan Engel, and Taylor Griffin. Ernie Undertot, engineer this episode. Thanks also to Drew Burrows and Emil Saverio. Make sure you subscribe to the show wherever you listen to podcasts. Thank you for listening to Pivot from New York Magazine and Vox Media. We'll be back next week for another breakdown of all things tech and business. Two things. The first is lucky. The second is jello shots.

1:03:19they had jello shots at the at the event by the way they were good yeah i see those in college support for the show comes from odoo running a business is hard enough and you don't need to make it harder with a dozen different apps that don't talk to each other one for sales another for inventory a separate one for accounting before you know it you find yourself drowning in software and processes instead of focusing on what matters, growing your business. This is where Odoo comes in. It's the only business software you'll ever need. Odoo is an all-in-one, fully integrated platform that handles everything.

1:03:50That means CRM accounting, inventory, e-commerce, HR, and more. No more app overload. No more juggling logins. Just one seamless system that makes work easier. And the best part is that Odoo replaces multiple expensive platforms for a fraction of the cost. It's built to grow with your business, whether you're just starting out or you're already scaling up. Plus, it's easy to use, customizable, and designed to streamline every process. It's time to put the clutter aside and focus on what really matters, running your business. Thousands of businesses have made the switch, so why not you? Try Odoo for free at odoo.com.

1:04:22That's O-D-O-O dot com.